Foucault and the Prisons Information Group’s Counter-subjectivation

Shai Gortler

doi:10.2298/FID2601173G

Authors

Shai Gortler Visiting Scholar, Department of History of Consciousness, University of California, Santa Cruz

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.2298/FID2601173G

Keywords:

Foucault, Prisons Information Group, counter-subjectivation, abolition, subjectification

Abstract

Between February 1971 and December 1972, Michel Foucault co-founded and was an active member of the Prisons Information Group (Groupe d’Information sur les Prisons, hereafter GIP). Through demonstrations, direct action, and publications, the GIP sought to intervene in France’s carceral regime and the set of systems, ideas, and practices that sustained it, in order to bring about its transformation. The goal of Foucault and the GIP was not simply to improve prison conditions but to disrupt the constitutive conditions of the institution. The archival material that Foucault’s involvement with the GIP left to society, alongside his lectures and publications, invites scholars to consider a rearticulation of our understanding of subjectivity. Reading Foucault’s tracing of the genealogy of the category “guilty” and the GIP’s analyses of prison uprisings facilitates a thicker understanding of “counter-subjectivation.” In opposition to the structures of carceral subjectivity wherein incarcerated people could never hope to influence the standards according to which prisons seek to “rehabilitate” them, the GIP calls our attention to a more democratic work of subject formation.

References

Agamben, Giorgio. 1999. Remnants of Auschwitz: The Witness and the Archive. Brooklyn: Zone Books.

Artières, Philippe. 2004. “Archives of a Collective Action.” In: Jaubert, Alain and Artières, Philippe, eds. Michel Foucault: Une journée particulière. Lyon: Ædelsa Éditions: pp.: 44–51.

Balibar, Étienne. 2015. “On the Trace of Althusser in Foucault’s Penal Theories and Institutions (1971–1972) – Foucault 13/13.” URL: http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/foucault1313/2015/09/22/foucault-213-etienne-balibar-on-the-trace-of-althusser-in-foucaults-penal-theories-and-institutions-1971-1972/ (last accessed: May 27, 2025).

Behrent, Michael. 2010. “Accidents Happen: François Ewald, the ‘Antirevolutionary’ Foucault, and the Intellectual Politics of the French Welfare State.” The Journal of Modern History 82(3): 585–624.

Bennett, Nolan. 2022. “George Jackson’s Perfect Disorder.” New Political Science 44(1): 75–89.

Brich, Cecile. 2008. “The Groupe d’Information sur les Prisons: The Voice of Prisoners? Or Foucault’s?” Foucault Studies 5: 26–47.

Chambers, Samuel. 2013. The Lessons of Rancière. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Davidson, Arnold. 2011. “In Praise of Counter-Conduct.” History of the Human Sciences 24(4): 25–41.

Davidson, Stephen. 1972. “Michel Foucault: Cérémonie, Théâtre et Politique Au XVIIe Siècle.” In: Renaud, Armand, ed. Proceedings of the fourth annual conference of XVII century French literature: pp.: 22–23.

Defert, Daniel. 2003. “Les Archives d’une lutte Emergence d’un Nouveau Front: Les Prisons.” In: Artières, Philippe, Quéro, Laurent, and Zancarini-Fournel, Michelle, eds. Le Groupe d’Information sur les Prisons: Archives d’une Lutte 1970–1972. Paris: Éditions de l’IMEC: pp.: 315–26.

Deleuze, Gilles. 1986. “Foucault and the Prison.” History of the Present 2 (1).

______. 1988. Foucault. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Dorlin, Elsa. 2022. Self-Defense: A Philosophy of Violence. London: Verso.

Elden, Stuart. 2013. “Manifesto of the Groupe d’Information sur les Prisons: A Full Translation.” Progressive Geographies Blog. URL: https://progressivegeographies.com/2013/08/02/manifesto-of-the-groupe-dinformation-sur-les-prisons-a-full-translation/ (last accessed: May 27, 2025).

Ewald, François and Johannes Boehme. 2017. “‘What Do You Want Me to Regret?’: An Interview with François Ewald.” Los Angeles Review of Books. URL: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/what-do-you-want-me-to-regret-an-interview-with-francois-ewald/#! (last accessed: May 27, 2025).

Foucault, Michel. 1977a. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. London: Allen Lane.

______.1977b. “Revolutionary Action: ‘Until Now.’” In: Bouchard, Donald F., ed. Language, Counter-Memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews by Michel Foucault. New York: Cornell University Press: pp.: 218–234.

______. 1982. “The Subject and Power.” In: Dreyfus, Hubert L., and Rabinow, Paul, eds. Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

______. 1989. “Sex, Power and the Politics of Identity.” In: Lotringer, Sylvère, ed. Foucault Live: Collected Interviews, 1961–1984. New York: Semiotext(e): pp.: 382–390.

______. 1994. “À Propos de L’enfermement Pénitentiaire (Interview with A. Krywin and F. Ringelheim).” In: Defert, Daniel and Ewald, François, eds. Dits et écrits I. 1954–1975. Paris: Gallimard: pp.: 1303–1313.

______. 2000. “Questions of Method.” In: Faubion, James D., ed. Essential Works of Foucault 1954–1984: Power. New York: New Press: pp.: 223–238.

______. 2003. “Society Must Be Defended:” Lectures at the Collège de France, 1975– 1976. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

______. 2007. Security, Territory, Population: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1977– 1978. Edited by M. Senellart. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

______. 2011a. The Courage of Truth. The Government of Self and Others II: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1983–1984. Edited by F. Gros. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

______. 2011b. “The Gay Science.” Critical Inquiry 37: 385–403.

______. 2015. The Punitive Society: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1972–1973. Edited by B. E. Harcourt. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

______. 2019. Penal Theories and Institutions: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1971– 1972. Edited by B. E. Harcourt. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Foucault, Michel, and Gilles Deleuze. 1977. “Intellectuals and Power.” In: Bouchard, Donald, ed. Language, Counter-Memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews by Michel Foucault. Ithaca: Cornell University Press: pp.: 205–217.

Foucault, Michel, Benny Lévy, and André Glucksmann. 1980. “On Popular Justice: A Discussion with Maoists.” In: Gordon, Colin, ed. Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972–1977. New York: Pantheon Books: pp.: 1–37.

Gandal, Keith. 1986. “Michel Foucault: Intellectual Work and Politics.” Telos 67: 121–134.

Genet, Jean. 1972. “Préface.” In: Intolérable 3: L’assassinat de George Jackson. Paris: Gallimard: pp.: 3–11.

GIP. 1971. Intolérable 2, Les Prisons. Enquête dans Une Prison Modèle: Fleury-Mérogis. Paris: Champ Libre.

______. 1972. Intolérable 3: L’assassinat de George Jackson. Paris: Gallimard.

______. 2003. Le Groupe d’Information sur les Prisons: Archives d’Une Lutte 1970– 1972. Edited by P. Artières, L. Quéro, and M. Zancarini-Fournel. Paris: Éditions de l’IMEC.

______. 2013. Groupe d’Information sur les Prisons: Intolérable. Edited by P. Artières. Paris: Verticales.

______. 2021. Intolerable: Writings from Michel Foucault and the Prisons Information Group [1970–1980]. edited by K. Thompson and P. Zurn. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Gortler, Shai. 2022. “Participatory Panopticon: Thomas Mott Osborne’s Prison Democracy.” Constellations 29 (3): 343–58.

Heiner, Brady Thomas. 2007. “Foucault and the Black Panthers.” City 11 (3): 313–56.

Hoffman, Marcelo. 2014. Foucault and Power: The Influence of Political Engagement on Theories of Power. New York: Bloomsbury.

Ilot, Luke. 2023. “Genealogy Beyond Critique: Foucault’s Discipline and Punish as Coalitional Worldmaking.” Political Theory 51 (2): 331–54.

Jackson, George. 1970. Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson. New York: Coward-McCann.

Jackson, George. 1972. Blood in My Eye. Baltimore: Black Classic Press.

Lorenzini, Daniele. 2016. “From Counter-Conduct to Critical Attitude: Michel Foucault and the Art of Not Being Governed Quite So Much.” Foucault Studies (21): 7–21.

Luxon, Nancy. 2016. “The Disordering of Discourse: Voice and Authority in the GIP.” In: Zurn, Perry and Dilts, Andrew, eds. Active Intolerance: Michel Foucault, The Prisons Information Group, and the Future of Abolition. New York: Palgrave Macmillan: pp.: 203–221.

Milchman, Alan, and Alan Rosenberg. 2007. “The Aesthetic and Ascetic Dimensions of an Ethics of Self-Fashioning: Nietzsche and Foucault.” Parrhesia 2: 44–65.

Mousnier, Roland. 1970. Peasant Uprisings in Seventeenth-Century France, Russia, and China. New York: Harper & Row.

Sartre, Jean-Paul. 1973. “Justice Populaire: Entretien avec J-P Sartre.” Pro Justitia: Revue politique de droit 2 (1): 13–26.

Secours-Rouge. 1970. Le Combat des Détenus Politiques. Paris: François Maspero.

Terwiel, Anna. 2019. “What Is Carceral Feminism?” Political Theory 48 (4): 421–442.

Tonry, Michael. 2011. “Introduction.” In: Tonry, Michael, ed. Why Punish? How Much? A Reader on Punishment. Oxford: Oxford University Press: pp.: 3–28.

Vásquez, Delio. 2020. “Illegalist Foucault, Criminal Foucault.” Theory & Event 23 (4): 935–972.

Wolin, Richard. 2010. The Wind from the East: French Intellectuals, the Cultural Revolution, and the Legacy of the 1960s. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Zurn, Perry, and Andrew Dilts. 2015. “Introduction.” In: Zurn, Perry and Dilts, Andrew, eds. Active Intolerance: Michel Foucault, The Prisons Information Group, and the Future of Abolition. New York: Palgrave Macmillan: pp.: 1–19.