Power-slash-Knowledge+(Banks)

A term attributed mainly to Michel Foucault that provides a basis by which an author can articulate epistemic claims to power through the legitimate channels of knowledge production. Power/Knowledge is often described as "knowledge is power" but such a simplified depiction does not describe the role institutions play, nor does it accurately reflect how these institutions use knowledge to not just gain power, but to shape and influence what power looks like and how it is enacted.

Joseph Rouse has written extensively on Power/Knowledge and sees it as a crucial tool for all social scientists studying a subject through history. He writes:

//"...Foucault was... fundamentally concerned that political criticism in terms of sovereignty, right and law dangerously misunderstands its own positioning. Here we find perhaps his most basic reason for juxtaposing knowledge and truth with power. It is one thing to articulate and take up a stance on the political struggles in the midst of which one finds oneself situated historically. It is another thing altogether to seek an epistemic standpoint outside those ongoing conflicts from which that stance can be validated."

=Knowledge=  Instrumental knowledge within a certain historical context is important for maintaining a certain kind of dominance. But in order to establish legitimate authority as a sovereign entity (whether that entity is a member of royalty or an abstract nation state apparatus) one must have control over the creation of certain kinds of knowledge. The sovereign exerts their power through and by the production of typologies and  the regulation of bodies as dictated by those typologies. For example, as Foucault explains in //Discipline and Punish//, the punishment for attempting regicide is very different from the reformist penal institute that would hold young prisoners until they had served their debt to society. Foucault says, after describing both forms of punishment,

 // "We have, then, a public execution and a time-table." They do not punish the same crimes or the same type of delinquent. But they each define a certain penal style. Less than a century separates them. It was a time when, in Europe and in the United States, the entire economy of punishment was redistributed. It was a time of great 'scandals' for traditional justice, a time of innumerable projects for reform. It saw a new theory of law and crime, a new moral or political justification of the right to punish, old laws were abolished, old customs died out..." (P.7)

 Foucault then goes on to track the disappearance of public torture and the rise of institutions of control and discipline. Going from punishment to discipline marks a fundamental change in how the sovereign regards transgressions and what is actually being controlled. While brutal, public punishment focuses on the crime and body, enlightenment reformism focuses on the criminal (not necessarily the crime) and demands psychological transformation of the mind. This shift (which is never total or complete) is only the tip of the iceberg. The labeling and controlling of bodies in this disciplinary manner are spread throughout society. Schools, factories, hospitals, and (perhaps one could argue) the DMV all attempt a psychological transformation- an internalization of the logic of the system. This modern disciplining maintains a normative state for society. Failing to read, exhibiting signs of depression, and not meeting production quotas are all judged within examination processes. Members of modern society experience power/knowledge through the examination. Failure to meet normative measures (minimum SAT requirements, DSM diagnosis criteria, units sold) triggers disciplinary measures.

=Power = Unlike pre-modern punishment, the carrying out and maintenance of discipline (e.g. Power/knowledge) is often invisible. The reports, grade books, and charts of the disciplined are handled by experts and bureaucrats, while the student/criminal/patient are held up as the atomic unit of analysis. The basis for their normative judgement is not quite explained, but their status is prominently displayed: i.e. "The patient has multiple personality disorder", "the prisoner is up for parole."

 The words that were just used as nouns in the previous examples, "patient", "multiple personality disorder", "prisoner" and, "parole" are all labels, categories, and types that are meant to do the work of disciplining subjects. A patient is someone that a medical institution controls and has power over. A person becomes a patient when they are sick. The line between sickness and normalcy (healthy-ness) is defined by professionals. The power/knowledge of professionals and their science are what police the boundaries of normalcy. Step outside of those bounds and these institutions begin applying labels and prescribe treatment that must be accepted by the patient at the psychological level. A group is marginalized and kept imprisoned in various institutions, and constant normalizing judgments seek out new individuals to put into groups or forms new groups as the historical moment requires. Rouse explains the particular ways power/knowledge constantly disciplines the body:

 // "These practices of surveillance, elicitation, and documentation constrain behavior precisely by making it more thoroughly knowable or known. But these new forms of knowledge also presuppose new kinds of constraint, which make people's actions visible and constrain them to speak. It is in this sense primarily that Foucault spoke of "power/knowledge." A more extensive and finer-grained knowledge enables a more continuous and pervasive control of what people do, which in turn offers further possibilities for more intrusive inquiry and disclosure. //

 // "Foucault saw these techniques of power and knowledge as undergoing a two-stage development. They were instituted initially as means of control or neutralization of dangerous social elements, and evolved into techniques for enhancing the utility and productivity of those subjected to them. They were also initially cultivated within isolated institutions (most notably prisons, hospitals, army camps, schools, and factories), but then were gradually adapted into techniques that could be applied in various other contexts. (P.4)" //