Introduction

• Published in: Power and Freedom in the Space of Reasons Vol. 1; pp. 1 - 5
• Main Author: Tiisala, Tuomo
• Format: Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: Routledge 2024
• Edition: 1
• ISBN: 9781032671376; 1032673052; 9781032673059; 1032671378
• DOI: 10.4324/9781032673035-1

This introduction lays out the plan of the book to present a new interpretation of Michel Foucault's philosophical work that is unified by the problem of structural heteronomy. At the same time, structural heteronomy constitutes a new systematic problem for the ethical outlook that is organized around the ideal of autonomy. On both counts, the guiding idea is that limits of intelligibility that are contingent but appear inevitable constrain our freedom as thinkers and agents. The book aims to show that such limits are structurally necessary for discursive cognition, even though they can always be reworked by means of critique, in Foucault's specific sense of the term. Ultimately, the problem of structural heteronomy reveals that the core distinction between power and freedom in moral and political philosophy needs to be revised and specifically redrawn inside the space of reasons. By acknowledging the problem of structural heteronomy, one acquires a new perspective to social ontology, and, consequently, to moral and political philosophy, in which power and freedom are essentially entangled. Thus, the book challenges the liberal and Kantian approaches that overlook the preconditions of the discursive cognition that enables autonomy, namely self-governed rationality.