Abstract
In a couple of previous articles I have tried to show why it is possible, interesting and philosophically crucial to tie together the perspectives on ethics and politics developed by Pierre Hadot, Stanley Cavell and Michel Foucault (Lorenzini, 2010a; 2010b). These three thinkers have indeed in common the effort to consider ethics as a non-teleological and non-deontological field (Cavell, 1990: 46), and they allow us to explore the link between ethical subjectivation and a politics of resistance — which is, in my opinion, one of the most urgent challenges for contemporary philosophy as well as one of the most important stakes of our global present. More specifically, in this chapter I will argue that Foucault’s, Hadot’s and Cavell’s perspectives on ethics and politics — or better, on ethics as politics — provide us with fundamental tools to conceive and practice philosophy as a ‘critical attitude’ (Foucault, 2007).1
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Cavell, S. (1989) This New Yet Unapproachable America: Lectures after Emerson after Wittgenstein. Albuquerque, NM: Living Batch Press.
Cavell, S. (1990) Conditions Handsome and Unhandsome: The Constitution of Emersonian Perfectionism. Chicago, IL and London: The University of Chicago Press.
Cavell, S. (2003) ‘Emerson’s Constitutional Amending: Reading “Fate”’ in Hodge, D. J. (ed.) Emerson’s Transcendental Etudes, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, pp. 192–214.
Cavell, S. (2004) Cities of Words: Pedagogical Letters on a Register of the Moral Life. Cambridge, MA and London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
Emerson, R. W. (1981a) ‘Self-Reliance’, in Bode, C. and Cowley, M. (eds) The Portable Emerson, New York: Penguin Books, pp. 138–64.
Emerson, R. W. (1981b) ‘Fate’, in Bode, C. and Cowley, M. (eds) The Portable Emerson, New York: Penguin Books, pp. 346–74.
Foucault, M. (1984a) ‘What Is Enlightenment?’, in Rabinow, P. (ed.) The Foucault Reader, New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 32–50.
Foucault, M. (1984b) ‘On the Genealogy of Ethics: An Overview of Work in Progress’, in Rabinow, P. (ed.) The Foucault Reader, New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 340–72.
Foucault, M. (1984c) ‘Politics and Ethics: An Interview’, in Rabinow, P. (ed.) The Foucault Reader, New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 373–80.
Foucault, M. (1987) ‘The Ethic of Care for the Self as a Practice of Freedom’, Philosophy & Social Criticism, 12, pp. 112–31.
Foucault, M. (1988) ‘Power, Moral Values, and the Intellectual’, History of the Present, 4, pp. 1–2, 11–13, available at: http://sitemason.vanderbilt.edu/histo-rydept/michaelbess/Foucault%20Interview (Accessed: 30 November 2013).
Foucault, M. (1997) ‘Sex, Power, and the Politics of Identity’, in Rabinow, P. (ed.) Ethics: Essential Works of Michel Foucault 1954–1984, Vol. 3, New York: The New Press, pp. 163–73.
Foucault, M. (2001a) Fearless Speech. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e).
Foucault, M. (2001b) ‘Conversation avec Michel Foucault’, in Defert, D. and Ewald, F. (eds) Dits et écrits, 1954–1988, Vol. I, Paris: Gallimard, pp. 1050–61.
Foucault, M. (2005) The Hermeneutics of the Subject: Lectures at the Collège de France 1981–1982, Gros, F. (ed.), Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Foucault, M. (2007) ‘What is Critique?’, in Lotringer, S. (ed.) The Politics of Truth, Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), pp. 41–81.
Foucault, M. (2010) The Government of Self and Others: Lectures at the Collège de France 1982–1983, Gros, F. (ed.), Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Foucault, M. (2011) The Courage of Truth: Lectures at the Collège de France 1983–1984, Gros, F. (ed.), Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Foucault, M. (2012) Du gouvernement des vivants: Cours au Collège de France 1979–1980, Senellart, M. (ed.), Paris: Seuil-Gallimard.
Hadot, P. (1995) Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault. Malden: Blackwell.
Hadot, P. (1998a) Études dephilosophie ancienne. Paris: Les Belles Lettres.
Hadot, P. (1998b) The Inner Citadel: The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press.
Hadot, P. (2002) Exercices spirituels et philosophie antique, 2nd edition. Paris: Albin Michel.
Hadot, P. (2004) What is Ancient Philosophy?, Cambridge, MA and London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
Hadot, P. (2008) N’oublie pas de vivre: Goethe et la tradition des exercices spirituels. Paris: Albin Michel.
Hadot, P. (2009) The Present Alone is Our Happiness: Conversations with Jeannie Carlier and Arnold I. Davidson. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Laugier, S. (2010) Wittgenstein: Le mythe de l’inexpressivité. Paris: Vrin.
Lorenzini, D. (2010a) ‘La vie comme “réel” de la philosophie: Cavell, Foucault, Hadot et les techniques de l’ordinaire’, in Laugier, S. (ed.) La voix et la vertu: Variétés duperfectionnisme moral, Paris: PUF, pp. 469–87.
Lorenzini, D. (2010b) ‘Must We Do What We Say? Truth, Responsibility and the Ordinary in Ancient and Modern Perfectionism’, European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy, 2(2), pp. 16–34.
Lorenzini, D. (2013) ‘Éthique et politique de nous-mêmes: à partir de Michel Foucault et Stanley Cavell’, in Lorenzini, D., Revel, A. and Sforzini, A. (eds) Michel Foucault: éthique et vérité (1980–1984), Paris: Vrin, pp. 239–54.
Mill, J. S. (1985) On Liberty. London: Penguin Books.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2015 Daniele Lorenzini
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Lorenzini, D. (2015). Ethics as Politics: Foucault, Hadot, Cavell and the Critique of Our Present. In: Fuggle, S., Lanci, Y., Tazzioli, M. (eds) Foucault and the History of Our Present. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137385925_15
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137385925_15
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-48142-2
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-38592-5
eBook Packages: Palgrave Religion & Philosophy CollectionPhilosophy and Religion (R0)