DOI: https://doi.org/10.17072/2078-7898/2019-3-320-330

Biopolitics and biopolitical economy: essence of concepts

Anton I. Zhelnin
Ph.D. in Philosophy, Associate professor
of the Department of Philosophy

Perm State University,
15, Bukirev str., Perm, 614990, Russia;
e-mail: antonzhelnin@gmail.com
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6368-1363

The article is devoted to the concept of biopolitics. An attempt to clarify the productive and economic basis of biopolitics is made (for instance the concept of «biopolitical economy» is formulated and analyzed). On the other hand, a conceptual distinction between biopolitics and biopower is shown. Biopower is a relatively new kind of power, spreading to the vital foundations of human and social life. Biopower is a bright representative of so-called «soft power», which does not imply direct control and exploitation, but acts indirectly, for example, through the artificial design and imposition of new needs, the promotion of new types of goods and services. Medicine became in this sense one of the indirect agents of biopower, which through processes of intensive medicalization begins to include more life situations and problems into field of its jurisdiction. Despite its «softness», biopower doesn’t cease to be power, since the asymmetry between its subjects and objects remains. Politeconomical approach is promising in analysis of biopower because the latter has economic roots and, in fact, arises as extension of power capital and consequence of its expansion into new spheres in search of sources for profit making. Several authors write about «biocapital» as a new form of it. At the same time, in modern society a global transformation is noticeable, which is associated with an increasingly large-scale transit to horizontal modes of interaction based on the network principle and involving broad autonomy, communicative and cooperative equality of its subjects. Power asymmetry is gradually «smoothed out». In this context, it is promising to consider biopolitics not as a simple consequence or expression of biopower, but as a potential qualitatively new way of interaction between people, public groups and institutions about the biological aspects of their life, directly up to the possibility of reasonable management of them. This management should be understood not as direct control but as foresight and planning with the aim of optimization of functioning and development of human biology.

Keywords: biopolitics, biopower, biopolitical economy, bioeconomics, biocapital, biocapitalism, soft power, medicine, medicalization, management, planning.

References

Agamben, G. (2012). Otkrytoe. Chelovek i zhivotnoe [The open: Man and animal]. Moscow: RSUH Publ., 112 p.

Agamben, G. (2013). Chto takoe povelevat’? [What is a commandment?]. Moscow: Grundrisse Publ., 72 p.

Alasaniya, K.Yu. (2018). Filosofskaya kontseptsiya biovlasti: istoki i perspektivy [Philosophical conception of biopower: sources and prospects]. Vestnik Moskovskogo universiteta. Seriya 7. Filosofiya [Moscow University Bulletin. Series 7. Philosophy]. No. 4, pp. 70–77.

Barbaruk, Yu.V. and Barbaruk, A.V. (2018). Biopolitika kak forma vlasti v sovremennom obschestve riska [Biopolitics as form of power in modern risk society]. Sotsiologiya i pravo [Sociology and Law]. No. 3(41), pp. 35–44.

Birch K., Tyfield D. (2013). Theorizing the bioeconomy: biovalue, biocapital, bioeconomics or... What? Science, Technology, & Human Values. Vol. 38, no. 3, pp. 299–327. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0162243912442398

Castells, M. (2013). Communication power. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 574 p.

Cheshko, V.F. and Glazko, V.I. (2009). High Hume (biovlast’ i biopolitika v obschestve riska) [High Hume (biopower and biopolitics in a risk society]. Moscow: RSAU-MTAA Publ., 320 p.

Cocco, G. and Cava, B. (2018). New neoliberalism and the other: biopower, anthropophagy, and living money. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books Publ., 254 p.

Conrad, P. (2007). The medicalization of society: On the transformation of human conditions into treatable disorders. Baltimore, MD: JHU Press, 224 p.

Goodman, A.H. and Leatherman, T.L. (eds.) (2010). Building a new biocultural synthesis: Political-economic perspectives on human biology. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 512 p. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3998/mpub.10398

Dubrovskiy, D.I. (2012). Biologicheskie korni antropologicheskogo krizisa. Chto dal’she? [Biological roots of anthropological crisis. What’s next?]. Chelovek [Human]. No. 6, pp. 51–54.

Foucault, M. (2004). The crisis of medicine or the crisis of antimedicine? Foucault Studies. No. 1, pp. 5–19. DOI: https://doi.org/10.22439/fs.v0i1.562

Habermas, J. (2002). Buduschee chelovecheskoy prirody. Na puti k liberal’noy evgenike? [Future of human nature. On the way to liberal eugenics?]. Moscow: Ves’ Mir Publ., 144 p.

Harari, Y.N. (2016). Homo Deus: A brief history of tomorrow. New York: Random House, 528 p.

Horne, R., Bell, J., Montgomery, J.R., Ravn, M.O. and Tooke, J.E. (2015). A new social contract for medical innovation. The Lancet. Vol. 385, no. 9974, pp. 1153–1154. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(15)60607-9

Huxley, A. (2018). Vozvraschenie v divnyy novyy mir [Brave new world revisited]. Moscow: AST Publ., 192 p.

Khardt, M. and Negri, A. (2004). Imperiya [Empire]. Moscow: Praxis Publ., 440 p.

Ledyaev, V.G. (2000). Vlast’: kontseptual’nyy analiz [Power: conceptual analysis]. Polis. Politicheskie issledovaniya [Polis. Political Studies]. No. 1, pp. 97–107.

Lem, S. (2002). Summa tekhnologii [Summa of technologies]. Moscow: AST Publ., 668 p.

Lemke, T., Casper, M.J. and Moore, L.J. (2011). Biopolitics: An advanced introduction. New York: NYU Press, 158 p. DOI: https://doi.org/10.22439/fs.v0i14.3906

Luman, N. (2001). Vlast’ [Power]. Moscow: Praxis Publ., 256 p.

Marcuse, H. (2003). Eros i tsivilizatsiya. Odnomernyy chelovek [Eros and civilization. One-dimensional man]. Moscow: AST Publ., 526 p.

Mingers, J. (2013). Self-producing systems: Implications and applications of autopoiesis. New York: Springer Science & Business Media, 246 p.

Nadesan, M.H. (2008). Governmentality, biopower, and everyday life. New York: Routledge, 248 p. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203894620

Nye, J.S. Jr. (2004). Soft power: The means to success in world politics. Public affairs. 191 p. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/20033985

Oleskin, A.V. (2007). Setevye struktury kak biopoliticheskiy proekt [Net structures as biopolitical project]. Vestnik Rossiyskoy akademii nauk [Herald of the Russian Academy of Sciences]. Vol. 77, no. 12, pp. 1084–1088.

Peters, M.A. and Venkatesan, P. (2010). Biocapitalism and the politics of life. Geopolitics, History, and International Relations. Vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 100–123.

Rabinow, P. (2006). Biopower today. BioSocieties. Vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 195–217. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1745855206040014

Rose, N. (2007). Molecular biopolitics, somatic ethics and the spirit of biocapital. Social Theory & Health. Vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 3–29.

Rybin, V.A. (2018). Biomarksizm: opyt noveyshey rekonstruktsii ucheniya Marksa [Biomarxism as the experience of modern reconstruction of Marx’s theory]. Vestnik Permskogo universiteta. Filosofiya. Psikhologiya. Sotsiologiya [Perm University Herald. Series «Philosophy. Psychology. Sociology»]. Iss. 2, pp. 179–190. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17072/2078-7898/2018-2-179-190

Samovol’nova, O.V. (2017). Sotsial’no-filosofskiy analiz osnovnykh kontseptsiy biopolitiki: M. Fuko, G. Agamben, A. Negri [Socio-philosophical analysis of basic conception of biopolitics: M. Foucault, G. Agamben, A. Negri]. Vestnik RGGU. Seriya: Filosofiya. Sotsiologiya. Iskusstvovedenie [RSUH Bulletin. Series: Philosophy. Sociology Studies. Art Studies]. No. 4–2(10), pp. 261–271. DOI: https://doi.org/10.28995/2073-6401-2017-4-261-271

Savulescu, J. and Bostrom, N. (eds.) (2010). Human enhancement. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 432 p.

Schaltegger, S., Burritt, R. and Petersen, H. (2017). An introduction to corporate environmental management: Striving for sustainability. Routledge, 384 p. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781351281447

Viner, N. (1994). Individual’nyy i obschestvennyy gomeostazis [Individual and social homeostasis]. Obschestvennye nauki i sovremennost’ [Social Sciences and Contemporary World]. No. 6, pp. 127–130.

Yablokov, A.V., Levchenko, V.F. and Kerzhentsev, A.S. (2017). O kontseptsii «upravlyaemoy evolutsii» kak al’ternativnye kontseptsii «ustoychivogo razvitiya» [The conception of «controlled evolution» as an alternative to the conception of «sustainable development»]. Teoreticheskaya i prikladnaya ekologiya [Theoretical and Applied Ecology]. No. 2, pp. 4–8. DOI: https://doi.org/10.25750/1995-4301-2017-2-004-008

Received 28.06.2019

For citation:

Zhelnin A.I. Biopolitics and biopolitical economy: essence of concepts // Perm University Herald. Series «Philosophy. Psychology. Sociology». 2019. Iss. 3. P. 320–330. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17072/2078-7898/2019-3-320-330