Writing in the same year that Thatcher was elected, Foucault described a nascent neoliberalism that we now experience in its mature state. For those of us born in a post-Reagan America, having operated within this system our whole lives, there can be no doubt that Foucault’s thinking describes our present. As graduate students, we’ve taken the risk of investing our human capital in an academic career. But if the ivory tower has always been derided for insulating itself from the so-called “real world,” that insulation seems to offer little protection from the realities of neoliberalism. The things that would seem most incommensurate with economic rationality — the rigor of our ideas and the quality of our teaching — are judged increasingly by economic standards.
The contours of the neoliberal university are by now as familiar to Chronicle of Higher Education subscribers as they are to readers of the New York Times. Humanities departments shrink while “career services” grow. Corporate funding for research blurs the lines between scholarly inquiry and product development. It also encourages scholars to end papers with some version of “more research is needed.” Tenured professors are replaced by adjuncts and graduate students. Faculty are evaluated and promoted according to a model of “discipline and publish.” Humanities majors are consoled that their writing skills will help them find a job that pays off their debt. Critique is marketed as critical thinking skills, while the humanities justify themselves as neoliberal arts. Foucault was one of the first and one of the best to explain the system of rationality and power in which we live. The question of “Foucault: After 1984” — and the question for those of us still engaged with his work — is whether he can help us get out of it.
– Foucault’s Risks by Anna Shechtman, Peter Raccuglia & Susan Morrow, Los Angeles Review of Books
(thanks to Amy DiGennaro)