Towards a grounding of the agentive subject in narrative therapy

• Published in: Theory & psychology Vol. 22; no. 5; pp. 626 - 642
• Main Author: Guilfoyle, Michael
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.10.2012; Sage Publications Ltd
• Subjects: Agency; Commitments; Foucault, Michel; Freedom; Loyalty; Narratives; Philosophers; Post-structuralism; Power; Proposals; Psychotherapy; Subject; Therapy; White, Michael; constituted subject; agency; Foucault; narrative therapy; agentive subject
• ISSN: 0959-3543; 1461-7447
• DOI: 10.1177/0959354311433446

This paper examines the tensions between narrative therapy’s self-identification as a Foucauldian poststructural practice, and its attachment to the notion of personal agency. Michael White—narrative therapy’s primary author—used Foucault’s work as a theoretical foundation, moving us to pose a question that White did not address: Can the narrative therapeutic commitment to an agentive subject be sustained alongside White’s loyalty to the Foucauldian notion of power/knowledge and its account of the constituted subject? I argue that while Foucault is often criticized for not making space for freedom or agency, something like an agentive subject is implicit in, even required for, his constitutionalist perspective to work. Working through this problem could be useful for the developing field of narrative therapy. Three proposals are offered as a way of imagining this agentive figure, and their relevance to narrative therapy practice is discussed.