Meaning and Military Power: Moving on From Foucault


Michel Foucault’s analysis of military power, drill and the ‘docile
body’ is fundamental to _Discipline and Punish_. It has been deeply
influential but is in need of challenge. His account suggests that in
the army the self is replaced by the automaton. Although there is deep
individuation and increasingly local autonomy of action, there is also a
passive dependence upon authority and an emptying out or thinning of
identity. Drawing on military sociology the paper proposes an
alternative logic of military organization, training and power. This
suggests a continuing role for meaning and subjectivity that is broadly
consistent with Durkheimian and Yale Strong Program theory. Military
effectiveness depends on small group solidarity, the construction of a
soldierly identity, the deployment of semiotic and narrative systems,
and the direction rather than suppression of emotions. We should perhaps
rethink the relationship of discipline to meaning and power in modernity.