Michel Foucault: Structures of Truth and Power

Abstract

The concept of regime of truth clearly refers to the well-known circularity Foucault establishes between power and knowledge: we should speak of a ‗regime‘ of truth because truth is produced, sustained, valorized and regulated by a series of mechanisms, techniques and procedures that are ‗political‘ if we understand this term the way Foucault does: politics has to do not only with institutions, but with the complex and constitutive field of power relations within which we ordinarily live, and at the same time truth itself reinforces and induces effects of power. A regime of truth is thus the strategic field within which truth is produced and becomes a tactical element in the functioning of a certain number of power relations. The idea that truth gives us no choice, that truth necessarily forces us to accept it and build up our conduct in accordance to it, is an extremely dangerous ethico-political trap that Foucault can help us to unmask and overcome. The present paper discusses the various dimensions of truth and power as narrated by Foucault.