Michel Foucault was a French philosopher, historian, philologist, social theorist and literary critic. He is often considered as postmodern and post-structural philosopher who is mostly known for his two masterpiece works such as 'Discipline and Punish' (1975) and 'The History of Sexuality' (1976). Foucault was born in a doctors' family where his father was an eminent surgeon whose father was also a local doctor. His mother was similarly the daughter of a doctor. Social scientists agreed that his keen interests on biopolitics, biopower, sexuality, and psychology inherited from his family legacy.
Foucault's biopolitics has overt and covert relevance in diverse academic arenas such as social sciences, demography, history of medicine, biology, environmental sciences, criminology, as well as in many other emerging faculties of knowledge. In all of these academic disciplines, Foucault's biopolitics gets especial priority in analysing the relationships of human beings with state and the influence of state on human bodies through various lenses. If we scrutinise the aforementioned academic spheres, we will see all of these entities give a major focus on human anatomy which is the central tendency of Foucault's biopower.
Foucault's notion of biopolitics was firstly introduced in the first volume of 'The History of Sexuality' and in the final section (chapter eleven) of the lecture series 'Society Must Be Defended' (1976) delivered at the Coll?ge de France from 1975-1976. Basically, this theory of politics roots back at the 2nd half of the 18th century. Before this, another version of power popularly known, according to Foucault, as disciplinary power or anatomo-politics of the human body was prevalent at the end of the 17th century and in the course of the 18th. Disciplinary power is basically centred on the individual body. This technique of power emphasises the productive forces of human body which is known as 'disciplinary technology of labour'. This version of power sees man as body that is under surveillance, trained, used, and if need be, punished.
Michel Foucault (October 15, 1926-June 25, 1984)
According to Foucault, the theme of biopolitics was emerged at the end of the 18th century and later on it developed through multiple political, social and environmental events such as the impacts of the First and Second World War on human bodies and environment. New technological anxieties of the mid 1970s and discoveries of biotechnologies specified more the prevalence of biopolitics. The new technology of politics challenges the central assumptions of the disciplinary model of power and considers men more than their individual bodies. This model of power sees man as species rather than man as body.
Bipolitics is underpinned three spheres of knowledge. First sphere of biopower includes overall processes of birth, death, production, diseases and so on. They include the ratio of births to deaths, the fertility of a population, morbidity, epidemics, endemics, natural disasters and so on. Natural and human-induced disasters, according to Foucault, made the possibility of death in the last half of the 18th century inevitable. Drastic number of deaths led to the development of medicine to medicalize the sick population and solve the problems of reproduction, the birth rates and so on.
Biopolitics's second domain encompasses accidents, infirmities, and diverse irregularities. This sphere also indicates the necessary problems of the insurance, savings, safety measures and charitable institutions for the working individuals. Final domain of biopolitics is the most important sphere of politics which spreads the 'control over relations between the human beings as species and their environment in which they live in' (Society Must Be Defended''1976: 245). This domain includes both the problems created by men in the atmosphere they live in and the effects of environment hazards on human species.
The following analyses intend to extract the relevance of Foucault's biopolitics in the 21st century. Firstly, population scientists in this century are busy to calculate the ratio of younger generation to the old, the fertility rates of the population, the future of the workforce in service and other sectors. Various national and international organizations are seriously working on the improvement of the human resources. States are also bringing paradigm shifts in their respective policies such as population strategies and family planning. China, for instance, has the largest number of population which is predicted to witness a zero population growth rate by 2030. Chinese slow population growth has come into focus of the policy makers in the beginning of this century. It is argued that slow demographic growth became possible due to the strict family planning policy adopted in the 1980s which limited one child for urban couples and two for rural. Keeping the zero population growth in mind, Chinese lawmakers adopted the policy in the begging of this year to allow all couples having two children.
Secondly, Foucault's second domain of biopolitics has reflected in the demands of the diverse associational, institutional and anomic groups of population all over the world. To this end, every group tends to organize movements, processions and meetings with the assurance of their human and fundamental rights. They throw various demands to the concerned higher authorities such as, the government and head of the business organization relating to their interests. The garment workers in Bangladesh mostly, for example, lead various movements on the issues related to the employment and workers' overall conditions include salaries, bonuses, increments and increasing facilities for the workers in factories, verbal abuse, physical assault, forced overtime, denial of paid maternity leave, unsanitary conditions, and failure to pay wages and so on.
Finally, climate change has already been termed as the biggest threat of the 21st century. This tension has developed due to the growing increase of the World's temperature, melting ice, raising sea levels and shifting ecosystems and biodiversities. Climate change occurs mostly due to the natural and human-induced reasons. Humans contribute to generate environmental disasters through greenhouse gas emissions, increasing aerosols in atmosphere and land use changes. Also natural disasters such as floods, storms, droughts, volcanoes, earthquakes and tsunamis are on the increase. In this regard, Bangladesh and Maldives are always seen in the hit lists of international reports on the impacts of climate changes. Environmental changes also cause the emergence of diverse kinds of new diseases in the 21st century including lung and heart problems, premature deaths, diseases induced from viruses and many others.
Amdadul Haque is working as a Researcher at Bangladesh Centre for Political Studies (BCPS) and as a Research Assistant at Microgovernance Research Initiative (MGR) in Bangladesh.
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