Michel Foucault

"... we are obliged to produce the truth by the power that demands truth and needs it in order to function: we are constrained, we are condemned to admit the truth or to discover it. Power constantly asks questions and questions us; it constantly investigates and records; it institutionalizes the search for the truth, professionalizes it, and rewards it. ... In a different sense, we are also subject to the truth in the sense that truth lays down the law: it is the discourse of truth that decides, at least in part; it conveys and propels effects of power."

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Source: Michel Foucault (1988). “Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel Foucault”, Univ of Massachusetts Press

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Michel Foucault

Michel Foucault

Philosopher, Social Theorist

Michel Foucault was a French philosopher known for his critical studies of power, knowledge, and social institutions, particularly in works like 'The History of Sexuality'.

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Michel Foucault Philosopher, Social Theorist

"'Truth' is to be understood as a system of ordered procedures for the production, regulation, distribution, circulation and operation of statements. 'Truth' is linked in a circular relation with systems of power which produce and sustain it, and to effects of power which it induces and which extend it. A 'regime' of truth."

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Michel Foucault Philosopher, Social Theorist

"There is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time power relations"

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