AGAMBEN AND FOUCAULT

EXPLORING THE LIMITS OF THIS PROXIMITY UNDER THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE ‘DESTITUENT’ THEME

Abstract

The work of Giorgio Agamben is punctuated by constant
references to Michel Foucault’s work, so that the latter appears as an important theoretical framework for the former. However, an effort to bring the two authors together proves to be quite problematic as it is perceived that the Italian philosopher operates certain methodological and conceptual categories fundamental to Foucauldian thought in a radically different way from the French philosopher. Such incompatibility is presented with greater clarity when we propose to explore the theme of the destituent in Agamben’s work, from which ontology, politics and ethics intersect, revealing the differences between the two philosophers. Thus, in order to expose the limits of this approximation, it will first be explored the methodological distinctions between the two authors
in their approach of the problem of ‘power’, as well as the way in which the concept is formulated in the work of each of them. Next, the general lines of the agambenian ‘modal ontology’ and the ‘ethics of inoperability’ will be presented
in order to conclusively explain the divergence between the ethical solutions proposed by Foucault and Agamben in their later works.