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ABSTRACT: Political theorists and scholars approach Michel Foucault's comprehensive theory of power with difficulty. The modalities of repressive, productive, disciplinary, and biopolitical power are the cornerstone of modern power. However, using Foucault's genealogy of ideas to understand the intersection of these modalities is not without tension. This essay focuses on differentiating disciplinary and productive power acting upon the delinquent- juxtaposing Discipline & Punish and The History of Sexuality. Extending Foucault 's logic, I develop an understanding of the delinquent-not as an objective of knowledge-power subjugated by delinquency and used by the carceral archipelago-as a subject of possibility possessing the capacity to speak truth to power.
Keywords: Foucault, Power, Delinquency, Discipline, Punish
INTRODUCTION
The United States' juridical system and penal system have grown increasing hegemonic and punitive in what is now the era of mass incarceration in America. As a means of social control-an explosion in the rate of arrests and convictions-more felons have been "[subjected] to legalized discrimination in employment, housing, education, public benefits, and jury service" (Alexander 2010; 1-2) than ever before. Since the declaration of Nixon's War on Drugs, the "penal population [has] exploded from around 300,000 to more than 2 million ... drug convictions accounting for the majority of the increase" (Alexander 2010: 6). This explosion has its roots in the administration of financial incentives for police stations to increase convictions, whereby targeting surveillance efforts in poor neighborhoods have become imperative. In addition, the justice process has increased practices of "excessive use of stop-and-frisk ... and gratuitous citations for minor infractions" (Western 2014).
The power relations that have contributed to the development of such a large-scale prison system seem to have been constructed without any intentional manipulation from state or class interests; however, they have their origins in the Clinton Administration's "tough on crime" initiatives. Rationalized by "law and order" rhetoric, the public's perception of the responsibility of government in contributing to state and local law enforcement has amplified. Therefore:
Between 1980 and 1984, FBI antidrug funding increased from $8 million to $95 million. Department of Defense antidrug allocations increased from $33 million in 1981 to $1,042 million in 1991. During that same period, DEA antidrug spending grew from $86 to $1,026 million, and FBI antidrug allocations grew from $38 to...