Dancing with Foucault: On the Sources of Telic Power in Nonideal Social Ontology
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25365/jso-2026-9378Keywords:
Nonideal social ontology, Deontic power, Telic power, Åsa Burman, Johan Brännmark, Michel Foucault, ÁstaAbstract
This paper argues that Åsa Burman's concept of telic power in nonideal social ontology can be deepened by integrating Michel Foucault's account of power in both his mid-period work on governmentality and his later work on ethics. Telic power is the ability of individuals to act in relation to shared ideals. It emerges from two distinct but interrelated sources: (1) the internalization of ethical ideals through subject-formation and (2) governmentality as a structuring of conduct through rational norms and practices. To capture how ideals circulate across both registers, I introduce the notion of ethical discourse—the socially embedded circulation of exemplary ideals and role models. Ethical discourse functions both as a medium of normalization and as a resource for self-formation. Drawing on feminist critiques of gendered ideals, such as postwar femininity, and a critique of neoliberalism, I argue that Foucault's dual account of subjectivation and governmentality clarifies and expands Burman's schema of telic and structural power, offering a richer framework for nonideal social ontology.
References
Ásta. 2019. "Categorical Injustice." Journal of Social Philosophy 50 (4): 392–406.
Ásta. 2025. "Nonideal Social Ontology and Explanation of Statistical Facts: Comments on Åsa Burman." Philosophy of the Social Sciences, Special Issue: Review Symposium on Åsa Burman's Nonideal Social Ontology (0): 1–11.
Bartky, Sandra Lee. 1998. "Foucault, Femininity and the Modernization of Patriarchal Power." In The Politics of Women's Bodies: Sexuality, Appearance and Behavior, edited by Rose Weitz, 25–45. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Braeckman, Antoon. 2020. "Beyond the confines of the law: Foucault's intimations of a genealogy of the modern state." Philosophy and Social Criticism 46 (6): 651–657.
Brännmark, Johan. 2019a. "Contested Institutional Facts." Erkenntnis 84: 1047–1064. URL https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-018-9994-7
Brännmark, Johan. 2019b. "Institutions, Ideology and Nonideal Social Ontology." Philosophy of the Social Sciences 49 (2): 137–159.
Brännmark, Johan. 2021. "Patriarchy as Institutional." Journal of Social Ontology 7 (2): 233–254.
Burman, Åsa. 2023. Nonideal Social Ontology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. URL https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780197509579.003.0002
Butler, Judith. 1988. "Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory." Theatre Journal 40 (4): 519–531.
Foucault, Michel. 1976a. Surveiller et Punir: la Naissance de la Prison. Paris: Gallimard.
Foucault, Michel. 1976b. Histoire de la sexualité 1: La volonté de savoir. Paris: Gallimard.
Foucault, Michel. 1984. The Care of the Self: Volume 3 of The History of Sexuality. Translated by Robert Hurley. New York: Pantheon Books.
Foucault, Michel. 1990. The Use of Pleasure: Volume 2 of The History of Sexuality. Translated by Robert Hurley. New York: Vintage Books.
Foucault, Michel. 1991. "Politics and the study of discourse." In The Foucault Effect, Studies in Governmentality, with Two Lectures by and an Interview with Michel Foucault, edited by Burchell, Gordon, and Miller. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Foucault, Michel. 1997. Ethics, Subjectivity and Truth. The Essential Works of Michel Foucault 1954–1984, Volume I. New York: New Press.
Foucault, Michel. 2000. Power. The Essential Works of Michel Foucault 1954–1984, Volume III. New York: New Press.
Foucault, Michel. 2001. The Hermeneutics of the Subject, Lectures at the Collège de France 1981–1982. Edited by Frédéric Gros. Translated by Graham Burchell. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Foucault, Michel. 2003. Society Must Be Defended. London: Penguin Books.
Foucault, Michel. 2004. The Birth of Biopolitics: Lectures at the Collège de France 1978–1979. Edited by Michel Senellart. Translated by Graham Burchell. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Foucault, Michel. 2007. Security, Territory, Population: Lectures at the Collège de France 1977–1978. Edited by Michel Senellart. Translated by Graham Burchell. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Foucault, Michel. 2010. The Government of Self and Others: Lectures at the Collège de France 1982–1983. Edited by Frédéric Gros. Translated by Graham Burchell. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Friedan, Betty. 1963. The Feminine Mystique. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Halberstam, David. 1993. The Fifties. New York: Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
Mills, Charles. 2005. "'Ideal Theory' as Ideology." Hypatia 20 (3): 165–184.
Schelling, Thomas. 2006. Micromotives and Macrobehavior. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Searle, John. 2010. Making the Social World: The Structure of Human Civilization. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Thompson, Edward. 1963. The Making of the English Working Class. London: Penguin Classics, Penguin Random House.
Williams, Bernard. 1985. Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy. London and New York: Routledge Classics.
Williams, Bernard. 2008. Shame and Necessity. London and New York: Routledge Classics.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Peter Sucaet (Author)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
