Recognizing freedom

Abstract

Domination as opposed to what? Michel Foucault’s works on power and subject formation uncover the subtle ways in which disciplinary power structures create opportunities for domination. Yet Foucault says little about the forms of freedom that we should prefer. I argue that the proper opposite of Foucauldian domination is a version of the concept of social freedom found in contemporary recognition theory. I establish that Foucault implicitly commits himself to an ontological concept of recognition in which the subject is constituted by acts that affirm particular qualities. On the basis of this ontological commitment, there is room for Foucault to endorse an ethical concept of recognition as well, in which the subject’s freedom is bound to a variety of forms of institutional and interpersonal recognition. Finally, Foucauldian insights regarding the potentially dominating tendencies of genuine acts of recognition lead to helpful modifications of the concept of social freedom.