Module VI·Article I·~2 min read
Foucault and Discourse: Knowledge as Power
Language, Power, and Social Identity
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What is Discourse
Michel Foucault used the concept of "discourse" in a specific sense: not simply “speech” or “text,” but a system of rules determining what can be said, how it can be said, who has the right to speak, and what is considered “truth” in a given epoch.
Discourse is power structuring knowledge. The medical discourse of the 19th century created the “patient” as an object of study, the “mentally ill” as a category for control, the “doctor” as the bearer of legitimate knowledge about bodies. Before the emergence of this discourse, “madness” was understood differently—as wisdom, possession, or moral failing.
“Psychiatric power” (Foucault): psychiatry does not simply treat diseases—it creates norms, defines the “normal” and the “pathological,” and exercises social control through medical language.
Power and Resistance
Foucault: power is not the property of a class or the state. It is a relation permeating all levels of society. Where there is power, there is resistance. Resistance also operates through language and discourse.
“Disciplinary power”: unlike sovereign power (which punishes publicly), disciplinary power works subtly—through surveillance, normalization, examination. Prison, school, hospital, barracks, factory—all use the same mechanism: to make bodies visible and manageable.
This sounds abstract—but has concrete consequences. Corporate “performance culture” (KPI, performance reviews, 360-feedback) is a form of disciplinary power: normalization, surveillance, self-surveillance. It is not the overseer watching—the worker watches himself through the eyes of the system.
Critical Discourse Analysis
Critical discourse analysis (Norman Fairclough, Teun van Dijk) is an applied field analyzing how language reproduces power. Political speeches: how the “other” is constructed (immigrant, terrorist). Media: how events are framed. Corporate language: how “restructuring” masks dismissals.
By analyzing discourse, we ask questions: Who speaks? Who is silent? What is taken for granted? What cannot be said? Whose interests does this discourse serve?
Question for reflection: What “discourse” dominates in your organization? What in it “cannot be said”—which topics are taboo, which questions are “uncomfortable”? Whose interests does this silence serve?
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