The courses at the college of France of Mr. Foucault were devoted, in 1982-1983, to the “ dramatic truth », That is to say to the way in which the utterance of the truth modifies the one who has the courage to say it. Because philosophical discourse for Foucault is not only carrying a rational thought, it is above all thought in action.
The government of self and others opens onto a famous play, the analysis of Wast ist aufklärung ? of Kant, “ Text for me a little coat of arms, a little favorite Said Foucault on January 5 (p. 8). This is the first edition, strictly speaking, what was so far known only by the text of the communication of May 27, 1978 to the French Society of Philosophy (“ What is criticism ? »), Published in the Bulletin of the latter and not taken up in the Said and writtenor possibly by the text published in the Literary Magazine In May 1984, a month before the death of Foucault. This article, early tribute and publication event, was precisely from January 1983 lessons at the Collège de France. We therefore now have the complete and authorized analysis of “ the ontology of the news ». But this provision also gives a context to this analysis, and thereby raises new questions: what is the link between this “ news online “, Also called by Foucault” ontology of ourselves “, And what, once past the” blazon Initial, most of the 1982-1983 course is devoted, namely the “ dramatic truth »» ? How to reflect, from Kant’s pamphlet, on the news of the Enlightenment for “ We “, Presented (p. 8) as” Not exactly an excursus: a small exergue “, But that her position at the opening of the course is necessarily in the key to reading the whole, is it based on the exegetes of theIon D’Euripid, or from the seventh letter from Plato, who develop this dramatic of the truth ?
Truth in politics
The link is to be found first in the practice of teachers of Foucault. For the public of the College of France, he often reads and comments for a long time texts, that of Kant, then those of Euripides and Plato, as well as others of Plutarch (which tells the confrontation between the philosopher and the tyrant de Syracuse, exemplary scene of the pursuingTHE “ Courage of Truth »), Polybius or Thucydides. These text explanations allow him to bring back the historical displacement of ancient speech-gradually transformed at the time of Plato, and with Plato, attribute and duty of the Athenian citizen that he was, as a necessary help from the Sage to the Prince-to a question that crosses these political experiences to us, in their very differences: the question of the emergence and the incidence of truth in politics. On page 168, it is still from Athenian democracy that Foucault speaks, in conclusion of an analysis of the difference between good pursuingdefined from the speeches of Pericles in Thucydides, and bad pursuingunderstood using Isocrates as a true true speech which flats dominant opinions to ensure the safety of the speaker. He then comments:
“” Well, at one time, ours, where we love to pose the problems of democracy so much in terms of distribution of power, autonomy of each in the exercise of power, in terms of transparency and opacity, relationship between civil society and state, I believe that it is perhaps good to recall this old question, which was contemporary with the very functioning of Athenian democracy and its crises, namely the question of the true and the necessary discourse, Fragile that true discourse cannot fail to introduce into a democracy, a democracy which both makes this true speech possible and constantly threatens it. »»
The dramatic of truth constitutes the analysis of these “ facts of speech which show how the very event of the enunciation can affect the being of the enunciator Who has the courage to tell the truth and to bond, by a free choice, to the risky utterance of the truth (p. 66). She joins the ontology of the news, through the injunction of thinking by oneself (“ Sapper Aude ! ) That the text of Wast ist aufklärung ? states in an increasingly manifestly paradoxical mode as it takes place, through the praise of the liberating power of the King of Prussia.
Of the philosophy of acts of language to language in action
The importance of this course, expected, partly known before its publication, makes it possible to go straight to the question of use which can be made of it today. While a whole line of works inspired by the lessons of the last years of Foucault has set out to develop a story of the links between philosophical culture of his own soul and formation of that of (good) prince, thus made capable of governing well, it appears here that these questions of intellectual history, less fertile than other than he posed in 1982-1983, were probably no longer central to him at that moment. In a sense, the 1982-1983 course, through the “ dramatic truth », Back to older texts from Foucault, The order of the speech in the first place, which thus presented the historical emergence of “ the opposition of the true and the false “:
“” In Greek poets of Vie Another century, the true speech – in the strong and valued sense of the word – the true discourse for which we had respect and terror, the one to which we had to submit, because it reigned was the discourse made by which of law and according to the required ritual ; (…) It was the discourse which, prophesying the future, not only announced what was going to happen, but contributed to its realization, carried with oneself the adhesion of men and thus traded with destiny. Now here that one century later the highest truth no longer resided in whatwas speech or in what he didshe lived in that he said : one day came when the truth moved from the ritualized, effective, and just, enunciation act, towards the statement itself ; towards its meaning, its form, its object, its relation to the reference. Between Hesiod and Plato a certain sharing has established itself, separating true discourse and false discourse ; Sharing new since now true discourse is no longer precious and desirable discourse, since it is no longer the discourse linked to the exercise of power. The sophist is hunted. »»
The sophist’s banishment is found in The government of self and otherswhen Foucault returns, at the end of the course, to the Platonic opposition between rhetoric and philosophy (lessons on March 2 and 9). The novelty of the “ dramatic truth », Through the resumption of the same story, is in the insistence that it puts to emerge from all pragmatic, from all philosophy of acts of language, and in truth from all philosophy of language: the pursuing is not the performative. Instead, these are the conditions for reflection on discourse as an event, as to do, as a necessarily located action that are put in place: we will read in this sense the proposals on the “ real philosophy », On philosophical discourse as a task, ergonand not as simple logosp. 209 and following. We must not have to hurry to deplore that Foucault cuts here the analysis of discourse of that of his social and therefore historical conditions, nor to note that the list of characters likely to be the subject of a study “ dramatic “(“ the Prophet, the Devin, the philosopher, the scientist », P. 66) is made up of figures provided with a status, therefore that can be referred to a pragmatic. The main thing, in this course where he appears fully, resolutely and deliberately as a philosopher, is located elsewhere, in the momentum than the reflection on the “ Courage of Truth “Succeeds in taking, outside the” History of systems thought », Towards another possible story, this one without closing: a story of thought, speech, truth in action.