8

Hegel, Foucault, and

Critical Hermeneutics
Sbaun Gallagher
T
o the extent that modern utopianism would deny certain
hermeneutical principles, one can contrast a critical theory that
is utopian to one that is hermeneutical. Utopian thought seeks
to free itself from the force of the past and from circumstances of the
present, to move in the direction of a perfected future. Hermeneutics,
in contrast, while allowing for the possible transformation of past tra-
ditions and present conditions recognizes that this possibility is inescap-
ably constrained by the historical effects of the past and the resistances
of the present. We might say that hermeneutics "modestly sets up house
within necessity," whereas utopianism seeks to design a new edifice
outside the requirements of reality. On the basis of this distinction I
want to explore conflicting conceptions of t-ritical theory found in
Hegel, Habermas, and Foucault.
Jtirgen Habermas interprets Hegel as moving away from an early
appreciation and practice of political critique toward a later acquies-
cence in the face of political reality. One aspect of this move concerns
Hegel's privileging of particularity over universality. Indeed, Habermas
1. Herben Marcuse on<.-e char.a<.1erized Hegel's <.-oncept of freedom in this way: "it
modestly seLs up house within neces.o;ity. Marcuse probably meant a pani<.'Uiar na:essity.
With respect to hermeneutics we mean the na:essity of panicularity. See Herben Man:u.o;e.
"Philosophy and Critical Theory," in Crlltcal 7beory: 7be lissenhal Readtnss. eds. David
lngr.am and julia Slmon-lngr.am (New York: Par.agon House, 199.2), p. 7.
145
SHAUN GALU.GHF.R
blames Hegel's own "particularism" on his inability "to transcend his
time and his circumstances. "
2
This interpretation of Hegel motivates a
question about the role played by universalism in critical theory. If we
distinguish two parts of critical theory, the critique of what is and the
critical reconstruction of what ought to be, then the issue I want to
address concerns to what extent some form of universalism is required
for either part. To what extent is it actually possible to reach a universal
perspective from within a situation that calls for critique, and to what
extent is it still possible to conduct a critical reconstruction, if a uni-
versal perspective is impossible?
For Habermas these questions are related to other issues concern-
ing modem time consciousness, the role played by utopianism in criti-
cal theory, and the requirement that critique must be conducted on the
basis of a rationality that itself is not susceptible to critique. Especially
with respect to the latter issue, Habermas places Foucault, in relation
to Hegel, on the opposite extreme of the critical scale. If Hegel, in his
later work, gives up critique in favor of speculative observation from
the heights of a transmodern absolute rationality, Foucault pushes cri-
tique to its bottom-most foundations by engaging in a self-defeating,
postmodem critique, that is, a critique so radical that it undermines the
very grounds of rationality required for critique. Hegel and Foucault are
also condemned by Habermas for what they have in common: an
orientation toward the historical past that excludes the possibility of a
critical utopian prospectus for the future.
I want to argue that predsely where Habermas finds a lack of
critique, that is, in the later Hegel, one can find the basis for a con-
ception of critique different from Habermas' own. In contrast to
Habermas' reading, not only is critique possible for the later Hegel, hut
Hegel develops, in principle, even -if not in practice, a hermeneutical
conception of critique that reorders the relation of particular to univer-
sal. I will not claim that Hegel actually carries out a critique of this sort.
Hegel was unable to free from the demands of his systemati-
zation to employ the appropriate elements of his system as critical
instruments. To put such a concept of critique into pra<.tice one would
need, as Foucault suggests with respect to Marxism and psychoanalysis,
to put the theoretical or systematic unity of Hegel's thought into ahey-
ance.3 Still, Hegel's particularism, if viewed under this qualification,
could he in fact the basis for what Foucault calls a "discontinuous,
2. JOrgen Haberrna!i, 7beory and Pracltce, traru;. John Vienel (Roston: Beamn.
1973>. p. 194; hereafter dted as 11>.
3. See Michel Pouaull, Sekcled lnlervtews and Olber WrlllnRs.
ed. Colin Gordon (New York: Pantheon 8ook.'i, 1980), p. 81; here-fter cited as P/K.
146
Hesel, Foucault, and Critical Hermeneutics
particular and local criticism," and thus could be a less utopian and
more appropriate basis for critique than the Kantian universalism taken
up by Habermas.
Of course, my intent is not to claim that Hegel and Foucault fully
agree on the nature of critique. Indeed, I would expect some resistance
to the very idea that Foucault could be considered in a favorable
comparison to Hegel. Furthermore, if we are seeking a critical theory
informed by hermeneutics, Foucault is no friend to hermeneutics and
often characterizes his own enterprise as something other than
hermeneutics. Nonetheless, in opposition to Habermas's readings of
both Hegel and Foucault, and in some respects, in opposition to more
general interpretations of Hegel and Foucault, I will argue, in a limited
and qualified fashion, that one can use Hegel and Foucault to define
a certain conception of critical theory that is opposed to the one Haber-
rnas traces on a straight line from Kant through the Frankfurt School.
Critique: From Hesel to Habermas
Habermas has always understood his own concept of critique in the
light of his reading of Hegel. According to Habermas, "Hegel inaugu-
rated the discourse of modernity," and recognized the essential di-
mension of critique involved in the self-understanding of
Modern rationality has a built-in capacity for self-critique which Hegel
attempted to activate in both his early theological and political stud-
ies. According to his theological writings, both orthodox and modem
Enlightenment forms of religion fail to integrate themselves in the
social and political dimensions of life, and thus fail to attain their true
universality. True universality, in this sense, is dependent upon reli-
gious spirit becoming embedded within the particulars of Sittlicbleett.
In his early political-journalistic writings, critique plays the role of a
"preventive reflection" that unmasks "merely pretended universality"
and reveals, as Habermas puts it, "the decadence of the particular by
confronting it with the mirror of the universal interests to which It still
4. My use of Hegel and Fou(aulr In thi!l context, while hopefully falling !lhon of
ahuse, 111 done in the !!plrlt of Fout:ault'll own pra<.1k:e with regard to "for
I prefer to utilize the I like. The only valid tribute to such as
Nletz.'IChe'li ill preclllely to Ulie II, 10 deform it, to make II gruan and prule!il" <PIK
S4>. The prutelil should not he too JCI'e"ll. however, If Romand ill ri!Cht in claim
thai floucaulr 10 a tradition that include!! Kant and Hegel. See communk'llllve
A(1ion and [)lalogil'lll Ethics: Hahermas and PouC"Jult," Polily 2S < 19921, p. H').
S. Hahermas. 7be Pbtlo6upblcal Discourse of Modemily, lr.lnS. Frederick G.
CCamhrldge, MA: MIT 19871. p. Sl; hel'e'.alter cited a.o; PPM.
147
SHAllN GALLAGHF.R
presumes" (TP 181-182). Habermas prefers this young Hegel who
would grant philosophy a critical role, "almost in the sense of the
Young Hegelians' ... claim for critique as preparation for a revolution-
ary praxis" (TP 180). Like Hegel's early journalism or Habermas's own
participation in the debate known as the Historikerstreit, critique, in the
spirit of the Enlightenment, can be embodied in a "historical-critical
discussion" or publicly conducted debate.
6
According to Habermas, and he is not alone in this interpretation,
when the mature Hegel discovers the objective power of Geist, he gives
up the notion of critique and concludes that philosophy cannot instruct
the state on "what it ought to be; it can only show how the state, the
ethical universe, is to be understood. "
7
For the Hegel of the Philosophy
of Right, Habermas contends, political critique, made possible in the
freedom granted to public communication is not really effective. Faced
with the rationality of the constitution and the constancy of national
sentiment, critique is rendered innocuous, made harmless by the ma-
turity of the nationalist spirit in its constitutional expression CPR 319).
Thus theory should not direct itself critically against the state, but
should simply describe what the state is.
Habermas' reading of Hegel is informed by his own conception
of a critical reflective practice that detaches itself from particularistic
and nationalistic prejudices. If this is what critique must be, then it
seems that the later Hegel abandons critique and makes it impossible.
In contrast to Habermas, I want to suggest that Hegel is working with
a different model of critique, one informed by a more hermeneutical
conception of the relation between the particular and the universal.
Hegel's principle in this regard, one that I consider to be a
hermeneutical principle, is clearly expressed in 7be Phtlosophy of Rtght:
"the universal does not prevail or achieve completion except along
with particular interests and through the co-operation of particular
[instances otl knowing and willing .... " CPR 260). This principle is
exemplified throughout his analysis of the political individual, civil
society, and the state. The individual, embedded within the particularites
of familial life and multiple movements of production and exchange,
conforms to universal Jaw only by following his or her particular in-
terests (e.g., PR 200ff). In a similar fashion, the administration of uni-
versal rights within civil society continues to be limited by particularistic
6. For a discussion of panlcipallon in lhe historians' debate. see Shaun
GaUagher, "The Htsrortkerslreu and the Critique of Nationalism," History of European
Ideas 16 (1993), 921-926.
7. Hegel, Tbe PbtlosqJby of RfRbl, trans. T. M. Knox (Oxford: Oxford Unlvel'liity
1967J. U I; hereafter cited a.o; PR. AllK> Habermaa, TP 1711-179.
148
Hegel, Foucault, and Crtttcal Hermeneutics
requirements and wills (PR 230, 231). Even in the most universal ex-
pression of the state, i.e., in war, state rights "are actualized only in
their particular wills and not in a universal will with constitutional
powers over them" (PR 333). Thus, the force of the idea of universal
law is limited by the reality of particular histories and conditions of
nations.
National self-consciousness, according to Hegel, is the internal
reflection of the particularistic external institutions that constitute a
nation. This reflective understanding is not necessarily acquiescence,
however; it can be "a vehicle for the contemporary development of the
collective spirit in its actual existence .... "
8
At the same time, taking its
start from is own particular situation, this reflective understanding, even
if it becomes philosophical as defined in Hegel's "Preface," lacks any
hint of a utopian tenor. To the extent that theory "goes beyond the
world as it is and builds an ideal one as it ought to be, that world exists
indeed, but only in [the theorist's) opinions, an unsubstantial element
where anything you please may, in fancy be built" (PR 11). Hegel cites
the Greek proverb: Hie Rhodus, hie saltus, and suggests what today one
might call a postmodem translation: "Here is the rose, dance thou here"
(PR 11). But for Hegel, the rose is not without why, and his advise
comes closer to the Derridian conception of "you must start where you
are," than to a Nietzschean prescriptive for dancing at the abyss. Clearly,
Hegel rejects the philosophical starting point of first seeking out the
universal (or the future utopia) and then applying it to the particular
situation. The starting point must be with the particular situation, be-
cause there is no way for a philosopher to go beyond it. In this respect,
Habermas is right to insist that Hegel was not able to transcend his time
or circumstances. Indeed, Hegel acknowledges this as a sound
hermeneutical principle: "Whatever happens, every individual is a child
of his time; so philosophy too is its own time apprehended in thoughts.
It is just as absurd to fancy that a philosophy can transcend its con-
temporary world as it is to fancy that an individual can overleap his
own age, jump over Rhodes" (PR 10.
This does not mean that there is no access to the universal. Rather
his hermeneutical principle defines that access. The universal can be
found only within the particular. The particularistic aspects of the in-
dividual nation embodies a universality that is expressed in the political
constitution and reflected in the sense of national identity experienced
8. Hegel, 7be PbtiOMJPh.v cf Mtnd (Encydopaedla, Pan 'l'hree >. trans. William Wallal-e
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971 ), l')'iO; hereafter cited a.o; PM. Al'IO st.oe PR 265; and 7be
PbUo.sopby of Htstory, tran.<;.). Slbree (New York: Dover, 1956>. pp. 43-46; hereafter dted
as PH.
14CJ
SHAUN GALlAGHER
by the citizen (PR 269). Universality is never independent of the par-
ticularistic nature of national identity. Thus, the constitution of any
particular nation, as the expression of universal principles, "depends in
general on the character and development of (that nation's) self-
(PR 274).
Although critique is still possible, the concept of a critical reflec-
tion that would somehow escape the limitations of finite and less than
ideal situations is ruled out. Critique, which is dialectical, cannot be
carried out from a position, hypothetical or real, external to the
particular time and place of the philosopher, citizen, or would-be
ideal legislator.
The proposal to give a constitution-even one more or less rational
in content-to a nation a priori would be a happy thought over-
looking precisely that factor in a constitution which makes it more
than an ens rationls. Hence every nation has the constitution ap-
propriate to it and suitable for it. (PR 274, Remark).
A real constitution is a historical entity. A historically detennined na-
tional consciousness, which rules over the formation of the constitution,
limits the universality possible in any national identity.
All of this dearly contrasts to Habermas' view of critique and his
conception of postconventional universality. Habermas attempts to work
out the possibility of postconventional (universal) identity in explicit
contrast to Hegel's concept of national identity and its dependency on
a self-conscious appreciation of national history.
9
On his view, only a
critical reflective practice that takes its bearing from universal rather
than particular laws can lead us toward a postconventional identity
based on "constitutional patri<?tism. "
10
To have a postconventional iden-
tity is to embrace values, not because they are held as authoritative by
some particular person, group, or nation, but because they are based
on a rational universality and consistency. Constitutional patriotism is
directed away from particularistic national qualities of citizenship to-
ward universal constitutional principles consistent with the Enlighten-
ment concept of world citizenship. Enlightenment determinations of
9. See my "Some Particular Umirations of Posrconvemlonal UniversaUty: Hegel
and Habennas, in PbenomenokJRy, Jnterpretatton, and CommunUy, c:d. Lenore Langsdorf
and Slephen Watson <Albany: SUNY Pl'ell6, 1996), pp. llS-126.
10. See Habennas, 7be New Conservatism: Cullum/ Crltlcum and tbe
Debale, trans. Shierry Weber NlchoL'Ien CCarnbrklge: MIT PreM, 1989), pp. 193. 227, 256;
hereafter cited as NC; and Communication and tbe f:volutlon of Soclt!ly, trana. Thomas
McCanhy (8oslon: Beacon 1979), pp. 79ff., 9S-129; here-.after cited as CES.
150
Hegel, Foucault, and Critical Hermeneutics
legality, morality, and sovereignty "are best suited to the identity of
world citizens, not to that of citizens of a particular state that has to
maintain itself against other states" (CES 114). Habennas, in contrast to
Hegel (PR 333), thus embraces a Kantian internationalism.
Haberrnas would reverse Hegel's principle, that the universal can
be sought out only from a position embedded in the particularities of
national life. The principle of constitutional patriotism demands that the
universality embodied in a nation's constitution rule over and define
the limits of the particularity of any nation's self-identity. For Habermas,
"the imperatives of the self-assertion of national forms of life through
power politics no longer simply dominate the mode of action of the
constitutional state but find their limits in postulates of the universal-
ization of democracy and human rights" (NC 256). This involves mov-
ing from a pretended universality embodied in conservative sociocentric
regimes and limited by a particular national consciousness, to universal
principles consistent with internationalism and gained through unforced,
enlightened consensus. In this move "identifications with one's own
[national] forms of life and traditions are overtaken by a patriotism that
has become more abstract, that now relates nOl to the concrete totality
of a nation but rather to abstract procedures and principles."
11
Brief Excursus on Time Consciousness
and Utopian Energies
Haberrnas puts into question the possibility of a critique taking its stan
from the Hegelian saltus, which is essentially tied to the bic, to the
topos of the particular situation. Indeed, if Haberrnas' critical theory
does not take iLo; stan "beyond the world as it is" in order to build "an
ideal one as it ought to be," it does seem to depend on what Hegel
refers to as an "unsubstantial" procedure by which anything you please
may, in fancy be built" (PR 11). While Haberrnas does not fashion an
abstract utopia, he is nOl shy about championing utopian energies. On
this score Haberrnas insists on the value of a modern time <:onscious-
ness that Hegel himself once recognized. This is an awarenes.o; of our
own position in time that "expresses the conviction that the future has
already begun: It is the epoch that lives for the future, that opens itself
up to the novelty of the future." (PDM 5> In every <."3se, modern
historical consciousness is ordered to the future; and this means that in
every <."3se particularity is ordered to universality. Habennas quotes
Hegel's Phenomenology: "It is surely not difficult to see that our time
11. NC 261' tr.mslalinn n-vl'it'd. Alv1 see PDM 40.
SHAliN GAUAGHF.R
is a binh and transition to a new period. The Spirit has broken with
what was hitherto the world of its experience and imagination and is
about to submerge all this in the past; it is at work giving itself a new
form .... " (PDM 6). u For Habermas, modernity involves an orientation
to the future that allows consciousness of the past to be overlaid by
conceptions of progress and utopia.
Habermas laments the present-day loss of clarity afforded by the
concept of a utopia as "a legitimate medium for depicting alternative
life possibilities that are seen as inherent in the historical process itself.
A utopian perspective is inscribed within politically active historical
consciousness itself" (NC 50). For Habermas there is a strong connec-
tion between the universalism necessary for critique, modern time
consciousness, and utopian energies-connections that have been sev-
ered and obscured: "Today it seems as though utopian energies have
been used up, as if they have retreated from historical thought. The
horizon of the future has contracted .... The future is negatively cathected;
we see outlined on the threshold of the twenty-first century the hor-
rifying panorama of a worldwide threat to universal life interests .... "
(NC 50). In Habermas' view, theorists like Foucault, pursuing a
Nietzschean nihilism, only help to "extinguish the last spark of utopia
and destroy the last traces of Western culture's self-confidence" (NC 52).
Habermas, of course, is interested in the rejuvenation of utopian
energies in connection with his project of communicative action. Seyla
Benhabib has pointed out that Habermas' project has the potential to
go beyond his utopian proceduralism. She finds "an unmistakable uto-
pian content" associated with the very concept of postconventional
identity.
13
For Habermas, however, this utopian perspective can be
attained only through a universalization of the realm of particular needs.
In this way "internal nature," the particularity associated with the realm
of needs, "is thereby moved in a utopian perspective; that is, at this
stage internal nature may no longer be merely examined within an
12. Concerning ulOpian energies in the early Hegel. see David M. Ra.'illlussen.
"Reflections on the 'End of History': Politics, Jdentlry, and CivU Society," Pbtlosapby and
SoctaJ Crlltctsm 18 0992), 23So-250.
13. Seyla Benhabib, "The Utopian Dimension In Communicative Ethics," in Crt/teal
7beory: 7be 1-:.ssentta/ Readtnss, David Ingram and julia Simon-Ingram CNew York:
Paragon, 1992), p. 390. Also see, "In the Shadow of Ari.'ilotle and Hegel: Communi<:ative
Ethics and Current Controversies In Practical Philosophy," 7be Pbtlosopbtcal Fmum 21
(1989-90). 1-31. Benhabib states: "UnlversalizabUity not only a formal procedure but
involves the ulOpian projection of a way of life as well" ( lj). The utopian here a
society designed to include everyone In the ongoinR moral conversation. "Discuur.;e
ethics !luch moral In which redprocal n.'Cognltiun exercised.
onto a utopian community of human kind" C23).
152
Hegel, Foucault, and Critical Hermeneutics
interpretive framework fixed by the cultural tradition in a nature-like
way .... Inner nature is rendered communicatively fluid and transparent
to the extent that needs can, through aesthetic forms of expression, be
kept articulable or be released from their paleosymbolic prelinguisticality"
(CES 93). This way of dealing with the substantiality and particularity
of needs is possible only if this realm is ordered as secondary to and
controlled by the universalized discourse of rights.
14
Precisely on this
point it is important to raise a question essentially connected to the
issues of universality and utopianism--the question of terrorism.
With respect to utopianism and time consciousness, George L.
Kline defines the issue of terrorism in terms that pose a difficulty for
conceptions of critique based on universalism. For Kline the problem
involves an obsessive orientation toward the world-historical future,
often found in utopian theories. This orientation is not confined to any
one ideological program; it is clearly found in the theories of both Marx
and Nietzsche, and quite often is defined in contrast to Hegel's "idolatry
of the factual. "
15
The concept of a historical utopia, as defined by
Habermas, is characterized by the same feature of a future-directed
orientation (NC 50--51). The most pernicious aspect of this future ori-
entation is the assumption that for the sake of achieving the perfection
of a universal utopian future, particular cultures, communities, and
individuals existing in the present "could justifiably be reduced to the
function of means for the realization of that historical end. "
16
Kline finds
evidence of this terroristic willingness to sacrifice present generations
in both the theory and practice of regimes dedicated to the realization
14. Benhabib notes that Habermas follows Mead in this regard {"Utopian Dimen-
sion," p. 395). Benhabib suppons a concept of untversaltzable need-interpretations: a
<."enain anticipatory utopia, a projection of the future as it could be. becomes necessary.
Since the lines of development leading from present to future are fundamentally
underdetermined, the theorisr can no longer speak the language of evolution and neces-
sity, but must conceive of herself as a panicipant in the formation of the future" (p. 398).
15. Nietzsche, On tbe Uses and Dtsadt'llnlll{leS of History fo,. Ufe, cited by George
L. Kline, "The Use and Abuse of Hegel by Nietzsche and Marx," in Hegel and bis Crll1cs,
ed. William Desmond (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989). p. 5.
16. George L. Kline, "The P01ential Contribution of Classical Russian Philosoph)'
to the Building of a Humane Society," paper read at the Colloquium on "The Problem
of the Unity of Mankind in Russian Philo.'iOphy, World Consrvss of Pbtlo.sopby. (Moscow.
August 1993). This is the latest formulation of a problem that Kline defines in a number
of papers, induding "'Present', 'Pa.'il'. and 'Future', as Categoreal Tenns, and the 'Fallacy
of the Actual Future'," Revteu of Metllpbys1cs 40 0986), 21'>-2.'\5: "Form, Concrescem.--e,
and Concretum, Bxplorrutons 111 WbUebead's Pbllosopby, eds. Lewis S. Ford and George
L. Kline (Bronx, NY: Fordham University Pres.'l, 1983), pp. 104-146: and "The Past:
Agency or Efficacy?" in AArlerr des XIV. lnternat#cmalen Konsresses /U,. Pb#losopbte < V.enna:
Herder Verlag, 1969>. IV, ~ ~ -
153
SHAUN GAUAGHF.R
of some future utopian world. Quite commonly, this kind of terror is
associated with a nationalism that is imperialistic and chauvinistic, that
is, with the type of nationalism that is falsely universalized and ex-
ported across political and ethnic borders. This is a type of nation-
alism that is quite distant from Hegel's concept, expressed in his view
lbat e\'ery nation has the constitution appropriate to it and suitable
for iC
1be mature Hegel, as Kline points out. scrupulously avoids the
rbesoric of future orientation and provides a much more adequate
model of time consciousness in his metaphor of organic growth.
1
"
Aa:on:liog to this model, the presen1 circumsunce is bol:h the onto-
lop:al and 2XiologicaJ poinl of depanure tovard the future. That the
real is l3liooal means that the only access e ha1o-e to a universal
raOOru!tiry is to be found precisely in the of the pre5en1 as it
has bcft1 shaped br the pasL One does 110( srep OUlSide of the
pan:ic1.1br8es of the presen1 (the real) in order to find an euemall}
defined unnersalir) that is then used as a !landard for
ntniMtg and tcnocizing the presen1 for the sake of constructing
future tmpia_
The CJ!If'Sion that IDJS( be raised is ilelhcr the UIOpian energy
d cbampioned by Habermas. even as il no-a} from
dJ:amoi5lic mtionalism. implies a similar porcrDal &cnorism Does a
aJiique dur appeals to the srandard of unn-ersalily drvalue
and in:5lrumefalize the preseru; does it den} the illlliiiSic .. of the
prescd. e:xisbng generations? L}uatd. fa one. reads
1-bbermas in preci'iely this way. L}owd inlerprels Haberm:as' ques1 for
trivenalily as a quesl for a roulizing unity of ilich L}U2Jd remains
Habermas' pro;ect can find ils legilirnaq. only in a future
ro be accomplished, in a preference for "the universalit). self-
ddcrmination, and tramparency of the future pmmised h, emancipa-
over "the particularity, randomness. and opacit) ol the prescnL
Allhough Lyotard usually associates Hegel wilh the same kind of quest
ror univeBalism, and indeed considers Habennas' pro;ed to be in some
respects Hegelian (PE 3. 18J. he also sees in Hegel an a-areness of the
danger of terrorism. In Hegel's view a critical hermeneutics ol suspicion
wbid1 takes the universal, in the sense of absolure emancipalion. as its
guide, always ends in a terror that puts every particular realily under
IUipicion. "So it judges any particular aa, even when il is prescribed
17. See Kline, "The IJ5e and Abuse <:A Hqd." p. 12; Hqd. PhG. Pmaa iZ-
18. Lyocard, 1lw Pmlrrrodl!m F.Jtp/lllrwd. tr.an5.. Don Barry er al.
fM.inneapolil: Univenily d Minnaoca Prts. 1992), pp. 18, l/J, o;o. Herrafter died as PE.
1'54
Hegel, Foucault, and Critical Hermeneutics
by law and executed according to the rules, as failing to match up to
the ideal. Terror acts on the suspicion that nothing is emancipated
enough-and makes it into a politics. Every particular reality is a plot
against the pure, universal will. "
19
Whether or not the terroristic arrangement of the universal in
opposition to the particular is a necessary result of Habermas' project,
at the very least it threatens as a possibility. But is it necessary that
critique be based on a universalism that seems associated with the
terrorism implied by a utopian future orientation? Is there another basis
for critique that reads the diale<.tic of the particular and the universal
in a different way?
Foucault and the Hegel of Particulars
Foucault, not unlike Hegel, offers a model of critique that takes its
point of departure from historical contents rather than from utopian
schemas or the metanarratives of totalitarian theories. Critique, accord-
ing to Foucault, needs to reveal the historical knowledge that is dis-
placed or hidden by functionalist or systematizing thought. His
genealogies are contrasted with "the tyranny of globalizing discourses
with their hierarchy and all their privileges of a theoretical avant-
garde ... . " (P/K 83). Genealogy provides the opportunity to use a
historical knowledge of power struggles; in contrast, globalizing
discourse, what Lyotard calls 'metanarrative', attempts to create a
utopian future. A metanarrative has two necessary characteristics: first,
it claims a universal scope. Its range is meant to cover all other
narratives. Second, it is normative in the specific sense that it claims
to supply the criteria to adjudicate conflicts among all other dis-
courses. Foucault's genealogies, in contrast, remain on a local or
regional level; they remain rooted in the particular and they refrain
from universalizing their results. Foucault distinguishes two steps: "If
we were to characterize it in two terms, then archaeology' would be
the appropriate methodology of this analysis of local discursivities,
and 'genealogy' would be the tactics whereby, on the basis of the
descriptions of these local diS<.'Ursivities, the subjected knowledges
which were thus released would be brought into play" {P/K 85).
Genealogies, as they are put into play, however, do not offer adjudica-
tive procedures that attempt to resolve the struggles they discover
through historical description. Not unlike Hegel's characterization of
19. Postmodern Explatrr<. p. S4.
155
SH:\l':li G.WAGHEJI
philosophy as the gray in gray of theory, Foucault n()(es, in an essay
in honor of jean Hyppolite, "genealogy is gray. . z o
The critical theorist might object that if the genealogical procedure
refuses to adjudicate, refuses, as Hegel would say, to reconstruct reality
as it ought to be, then genealogy loses its critical bite. Yet Foucault
pictures genealogy as waging a struggle, and it is in this struggle that
it finds its critical edge. By focusing on the particular it struggles against
the pretense of universality made by sciences, metanarratives, and
universalizing procedures (P/K 126). It struggles against the theoretical
avanJ-garde that claims to have privileged access to the future. It does
so precisely by exposing the pretense of universality to "all the discon-
tinuous forms of knowledge that circulate about it" (P/K 85). Genealo-
gies, then, are critical, n()( in spite of the fact, but because they lay no
claim to universality. Indeed, their criticality is to be found precisely in
their disruption of claims to universality.
Not unlike Hegel? It is true that Foucault, like Lyotard, would list
Hegel's discourse as one of the 'globalizing discourses' that he at-
tempts to struggle against. Foucault, after all, is author of a famous
philosophical apprehension: "our age, whether through logic or epis-
temology, whether through Marx or through Nietzsche, is attempting
to flee Hegel. ... "
21
Foucault, more specifically, struggles against
Hegelian politics, "the kind of politics which, since the beginning of
the 19th century obstinately insists on seeing in the immense domain
of practice only an epiphany of triumphant reason .... "
22
Yet, it is
clear that Foucault's engagement with Hegel (how else to struggle
against Hegel) is one from which he learns. On this score I want to
note three things.
First, the Hegel that Foucault was fleeing, or struggling against,
was the one provided for him by his teacher, Jean Hyppolite. Two
things are clear from Foucault's remarks about Hyppolite: (1) there is
no question of a clean break with Hegel. "But truly to escape Hegel
20. Foucault, "Nietzsche. Genealogy. History," trans. Donald P. Bouchard and
Sherry Simon, in 1be Fcmcaull R/Jader, p. 76. On the notion thai genealogy an he critical,
see Rudi VJ5ker, "Can Genealogy he Critical? A Somewhat Unromantic Look al Nie1Z5Chc
and Poucauh," Man and World 23 (19')0), 441-4S2. for a more Hahennasian vlc:w. sec
Larry Ray, "foucauh, Critical Theory and the Decomposillon d the Hislorlcal Subject,"
Pb1losopby and Social crutctmr 14 Cl988J. 69-110.
21. Poucauh, "l1le Discourse on LanguaRC." tram. Rupert Swyer, in 1be Archae
ology of Know/etJse. tran. A. M. Sheridan Smith CNew York: Pantheon Books, 1972), p.
23S. Hereafter died 35 AK.
22. Poucauh, "Polillc!l and lhc Study of Di.'K:oursc," traM. Colin Gordon In 7be
Fcmcau/t Hjfect: Stud#n In Governmenta/Uy, cd. Graham Burchell, Colin Gordon and
Peter Miller COticaHo: IJnivcl'!lity of ChicaHO Prt."M, 19'J1 J. p. fiJ.
1'i6
Hegel, Foucault, and Critical /lermeneuttcs
involves an exact appreciation of the price we have to pay to detach
ourselves from him. It assumes that we are aware of the extent to
which Hegel, insidiously perhaps, is close to us; it implies a knowledge
in that which permits us to think against Hegel, of that which remains
Hegelian" (AK 235). (2) Hyppolite provides Foucault with a trans-
formed Hegel. Hyppolite works an alteration on Hegel by which he
transforms "the Hegelian theme of the end of self-consciousness into
one of repeated interrogation" (AK 236). Hyppolite's Hegel provides a
philosophy that is capable of contact with non-philosophy. Specifically
we could say that Hyppolite provided a Hegel of particulars rather than
a Hegel of universals, and thus, a philosophy that has as its task, not
to abstract, but rather "to maintain a certain reticence, to break with
acquired generalizations and continually to reestablish contact with the
non-philosophical. ... to examine the singularity of history, the regional
rationalities of science, the depths of memory in consciousness .... [the)
singular individual, within a society and a social class, and in the midst
of struggle" (AK 236).
Second, Foucault's struggle against Hegel in some respects found
its way into his struggle to define the concept of power. Foucault
struggles with a notion of power that involves the concept of repres-
sion, a concept that he himself employed in his early work. "Though
one finds this definition of power as repression endlessly repeated in
present day discourse, it is not that discourse which invented it-
Hegel first spoke of it, then Freud and later Reich" (P/K 90>. Foulault
works out his own notion of power by combining the concept of
power as repression with a concept of power as struggle, which he
associates with Nietzsche. He contrasts this struggle-repression model
with an older view he terms the 'monarchical-juridical' or 'contract-
oppression' model. But in the mid-70s we find Foucauh questioning
the notion of repression as inadequate for explaining contemporary
mechanisms of power (P/K 92>. Specifically, he suspects that, in the
end, the notion of repression remains tied to the traditional monarchical-
juridical view.
It is quite easy to read Hegel as holding to a monarchical-juridical
model of power. According to this view the "essential role of the theory
of right, from medieval times onwards, was to fix the legitimacy of
power; that is the major problem around which the whole theory of
right and sovereignty is organized" (P/K 95). Foucault indeed does read
Hegel in this way. "As always with relations of power, one is faced with
complex phenomena which don't obey the Hegelian form of the
dialectic .... 'Dialectic' is a way of evading the always open and haz-
ardous reality of conflict by reducing it to a Hegelian skeleton ....
(P/K ~ . 114-115). Thus, Foucault's struRSle to define power is also
H7
SHAUN GAllAGHER
a struggle to free himself from, or perhaps, to transform Hegel and the
hypothesis of repression.l3
Third, it's possible that Foucault found something more positive in
Hegel. In his analysis of SUtlfcbkeit, Hegel suggests that power is embed-
ded in every human and institutional relation in a way that cannot be
reduced to the simple hegemonic, monarchical model. This idea is con-
nected to Hegel's view that economic relations are not disembedded
from other dimensions of Sinlfcbkeit. An embedded economic system is
one in which the economic factors of a society are so integrated into the
substance of society that, in practice, they are not distinguishable or
detachable from other factors of the moral and social infrastructure such
as kinship, marriage, generational differences, the variety of private as-
sociations, or public solemnities. The life Hegel describes as Sitt/fche
involves relations that are at once familial, economic, political, and moral,
with no actual priority awarded to any one of these dimensions.
24
Foucault, in attempting to work out a theory of power that is not
reducible to either a monarchical-juridical model or to an economism
that views power as subordinate to economic relations, seeks a theory
that would provide an alternative to the concept of functional subor-
dination, yet recognize "that the relations of power do indeed remain
profoundly enmeshed in and with economic relations and participate
with them in a common circuit" (P/K 89). It is possible to read Hegel's
analysis of civil society as a theory that would recognize the indis-
soluble interconnections between politics and the economy, without
reducing one to the other. In effect, it is possible to read Hegel's
analysis, at one level, as focusing on the particularity of power relations
within an early modem civil society, in a way that is not unlike the
analysis that Foucault was seeking. Foucault's use of the term 'govern-
ment' suggests what Heget recognized as the multi-dimensional and
comprehensive nature of power relations. The very broad meaning of the
word 'government' included reference not only to "political structures or
to the management of states; rather it designated the way in which the
conduct of individual-; or of groups might be directed: the government
of children, of souls, of communities, of families, of the sick. "Z\
23. Visker argue5 rhal "Poue2ulr never really 5Ucceeded in leaving rhe
of repreWon behind him .. ." ("Can GeneakJgy Critical?" p. 447J.
24. I have worked this out in more deull in "lnlerdependence and freedom ln
Hegefs Econornia," in Hegel on &onomta and Freedom, ed. William Maker IMercer
Univer5ity PreM, 1987J, I 59-181.
25. Pouauh. "11Je Subjea and Power, Afterward ro Michel Foucault Beyond
Structuralism and Hermeneulla, Hubert L. and Paul Rahinow ( Chi<:agn:
University of Chicago 1982), p. 221. 11115 hereafter died a.\ SP.
158
Hegel, Foucault, and Critical Hermeneutics
The individual embedded in the multiplicity of power relations
that constitute civil society, is, as Foucault points out, a subject in two
senses: a subject by way of being subjected to such relations; and a
subject maintaining an identity in conscience and self-knowledge. It is
precisely in this dual sense of the subject that Hegel describes the
essence of freedom. Freedom is actualized precisely when the subject
self-consciously recognizes and affirms or wills its actual subjectification.
Foucault also insists that government, in the broadest sense of the term,
requires and implies freedom: "Power is exercised only over free sub-
jects, and only insofar as they are free" (SP 221). But, for Foucault,
freedom is not the actual affirmation or willing of subjectification; it is
the constant possibility of refusing particular subjectifications. Not the
conformity of the will, but the possibility of "the recalcitrance of the
will," is the sign of freedom. "Rather than speaking of an essential
freedom, it would be better to speak of an 'agonism'--of a relationship
which is at the same time reciprocal incitation and struggle; less of a
face-to-face confrontation which paralyzes both sides than a permanent
provocation" (SP 222).
In the end, of course, Hegel and Foucault differ fundamentally on
the question of the nature of power and domination. Hegel works with
the conception of a monarchical power that operates as the principle
of his state system. This, to some degree, gets in the way of critique,
because, as he sees it, the state properly orders and centers all of the
multiple relations of the embedded civil society-and he reads this as
freedom rather than domination. Thus, Foucault suggests, "the theory
of sovereignty, and the organization of a legal code centered around
it, have allowed a system of right to be superimposed upon the mecha-
nism of discipline in such a way as to conceal its actual procedures,
the element of domination inherent in its techniques. and to guarantee
to everyone, by virtue of the sovereignty of the State, the exercise of
his proper sovereign right" (P/K lOS>. It is possible that Foucault. in
proposing a new conception of power, remains more faithful to Hegel's
conception of multi-dimensional embeddedness-an emheddedness
within mutual power relations of domination and "multiple forms of
subjugation that have a place and function within the social organ
ism"-a power that is spread out in "more regional and local fonno; and
institutions" (P/K96)-and thereby a conception that provides the ground
for a critique that remains connected to the particular contexLo; of
human relations. It is, then, quite easy to contrast a system of spirit
(Hegel) to a system of discourse/power (Foucault>: "r.lther than worry
about the problem of the central spirit, I believe that we must attempt
to study the myriad of bodies which are constituted as peripher.al
subjects as a result of the effects of power" (P/K 98>. Nonetheless, with
/59
SHAUN GALLAGHF.R
his conception of embeddedness, Hegel actually comes close to discov-
ering disciplinary power and its effects.
26
Perhaps on this count Habermas'
observation is close to right: his own particular time and place pre-
vented him from moving beyond the conception of sovereign power.
Crilical Hermeneutics wilboul Universals
Hegel's analysis of Silllicbkeit, if it does not precisely reach the level
of a critical hermeneutics, provides its basic principle. The fact that
Habermas controverts this principle leads him in the direction of a
utopian critical theory, and away from a 'depth hermeneutics' anchored
in particular topoi. The fact that Foucault affirms this principle leads
him in the direction of a critical hermeneutics and thereby qualifies his
own conception of a post-hermeneutical analysis.
27
Hegel's Hermeneutical Principle
First, we must note that there is no general agreement among Hegel
interpreters concerning the relationship between the universal and the
particular. Habermas himself reviews three approaches. Conservative
interpretations of Hegel make the abstract concept of universal right
conform to the particular character of nationalist spirit [ Lib-
eral interpretations find in Hegel the primacy of universal right over
particularistic national identity. Finally, left Hegelians (Habermas here
cites Herbert Marcuse) object to the threat that "substantive morality"
associated with nationalistic particularities poses to universal prindples
(TP 134-136).
I interpret the prindple explicated by Hegel to be a principle
consistent with philosophical hermeneutics. It is not that the universal
26. Both Hegel and Foucault would study the concept of right, not as it ought to
be, but as it manifests il5elf in the age. 1bey both ask how things work. Hegel's answer
is filtered through his systematic and monarcrucal schema; Foucault ill guided by hili new
view ol power. Is this a difference of aaes as weU as of concept?
7:7. Even if Foucauk is not concerned with devising on p-.1nicular
discourses, and therefore is not doing hermeneutics in illl traditional form. stiU, iii he nuc
concerned with underslanding the meaning and of pank:ular di!K."OUn!e!i, and
therefore, in some sense, stiU doing hermeneutic;? On issue, aec: Richard Palmer,
"Beyond Hermeneutics? Some Remarks on the Me-.1ning and Scope of Hermeneutics,"
llnWerstlyofDaytqn Rl!fllew 17 Cl984), p. S; and "On the Tranacendenlalll of Herrneneulk.'!i,"
in Hermeneullcs: Quertkms arul Protpects, ed. Gary Shapiro and Alan Sica !Amherll:
Univenily of MaMachuaens Prea, 1984J, pp. 84-9S.
160
Hegel, Foucault, and Critical Hermeneutics
is made to conform to the particular, or that the particular necessarily
threatens the universal; rather, it's simply the case that we have no way
to understand the universal except from within the particular situation
in which we happen to find ourselves. If, as Hegel puts it, "the uni-
versal does not prevail or achieve completion except along with par-
ticular interests and through the co-operation of particular [instances of)
knowing and willing," then our reach for the universal will always be
constrained by particular circumstances. In essence, this principle pre-
dates the Enlightenment, and expresses an ancient tradition that stretches
back to the Greeks. In the contemporary field of hermeneutics, Hans-
Georg Gadamer develops it further in his discussions of the hermeneutical
situation and the concept of phronesis. Phronesis does not operate on
the basis of universal, context-independent rules, procedures or utopian
goals. With phronesis we lay out no grand schemes for the future;
rather we start from the particular situation and do the best we can.
With phronesis we occupy no universally justified position from which
to judge, although we are always in a position and we always are
required to judge. So, we can only judge case by case.Zll
Hegel's principle is hermeneutical precisely insofar as it expresses
the concept of phronesis, a concept that clarifies the relation between
the universal and the particular.
29
For Hegel, we begin to discern the
universal only from within our particular circumstances. The concepts
of Sitllichkeit and phronesis are, for Hegel, dialectically connected.
Precisely because the citizen and the legislator are embedded within
their ethos, within the multiple dimensions of Sittlichkeit, without the
possibility of escape to the unfettered universal, they require phro11esis
as a way of coping. At the same time, to have phronesis one requires
an ethos, a stttliche backdrop, the particularity supplied by one's his-
torical situation. Thus, Stttlichkeit provides the resources for phro11esis,
and phronesls provides the means of dealing with and transforming
28. See Hans-Georg Gadamer, Trutb and Method. 2nd rev. ed .. revised translation
by joel Weinsheimer and Donald G. Marshall (New York: Crossroad Press. 1989), pp.
301-302. In Gadame(s terms, knowledge of a situation i."i always an imperfect knowledge
that is embedded within the situation. The model for such knowledge is pbronesis (set!
Ibid., pp. 313m. Gadamer explains the model of pbronesis in hermeneutk:ll terms: "it
doe."i n01 mean first understanding a given universal in itself and then afterwanl applying
II to a concrete case." Rather, the understanding of the universal itself is (."'mlituted
only through our understanding of the given (set! Trutb and Mf!lbod, p. 341 ). For
further diM.-ussion !lee my eMay, "The Place of Pbronesis in Po!ilmodem Hermeneuti<.'li,"
Pbflosopby Today 37 0993J. l98-30S.
}!}. Again, this conflku with Habermas' reading, according to whk:h Hegel had
abandoned pbronesu even hefore he abandoned (.Titique (!lee TP
161
SHAIJN GAllAGHER
Siltltcbkeil. Pbronesis, in this regard, can be both suspicious and criti-
cal, but it cannot be utopian. On the model of a critical hermeneutics
that would employ Hegel's principle, there are no universal prescriptives
that can be legitimately formulated in advance of particular situations
that call for judgment.
Habermas' Non-hermeneutical (Ctopian) Theory
For Habermas, the critical task is not directed at simply understanding
the present situation, but at changing it, by limiting the particularity of
the circumstance according to a universal norm or normative proce-
dure. This conception of critique clearly depends upon a principle
directly opposed to Hegel's. Habermas allows for the possibility of a
procedural disconnection from the particular. Thus, in critical recon-
struction particular national interests would no longer dominate the
universal aspects of the constitutional state, but would "find their limits
in postulates of the universalization of democracy and human rights-
(NC 256).
In Habermas' conception of the critical enterprise, one attempts to
stand outside of particular traditions and institutions in order to develop
a rational justification of transnational universal laws. Still, for Habermas,
as well as for Hegel, critique always requires a self-conscious reflection
on one's particular history. For Hegel, this self-reflection is embedded
within the particularity of a nation's traditions and is thus limited. For
Habermas, self-reflection is a 'gaze' that critically appropriates its history
in the light of an abstract and universal idea that we access as a measure
and use to decide "which of our traditions we want to continue and
which we do not" (NC 263). With this orientation to the universal, does
critique still remain faithful to the demands of the henneneutical situa-
tion, which is always a particular, historical situation?
In Habermas' debate with Gadarner, one of the issues involves
precisely this question: To what extent can one detach oneself from the
panicular circumstances of life? To what degree is it possible to attain
the universal? 1be critical gaze is, as Habermas acknowledges, educated
by its history. And he does recognize the force of the particular in the
realm of individual identity formation. On the level of an individual life,
identity does not depend solely on moral choice, i.e., a choice that
requires orientation within a universal.iMic There are adler,
particularistic forces involved in deciding 'who one wanu to be.'
30. Habennas, 11M 77ltiory of eommu,.#cllllw Praclfu, vol. 2, llallll. Thoma
McCanhy lBollon: Beacon. 1987), p. 'T1. Heralier clled u TCP II.
162
Hegel, Foucault, and Crlltcal Hermeneutta
There is an indissoluble element of arbitrariness I Wtllkurl in the
choice of a life project. This is to he explained hy the fact that the
individual cannot adopt a hypothetical attitude toward hit; own
origins and background, that he cannot accept or reject his biog-
raphy in the same way as he can a norm whose claim to validity
is under di.<;CUssion (TCP II 109)
Thus, the individual is embedded within Sittlicbkett, within a set of
cultural values, within a particularistic collective identity, within a his-
torical tradition. Yet Habermas still insists on the ability to disconnect
or to detach oneself from the particular in order to instigate a decision
within a universalistic framework (see NC 225, 257, 261). Even if the
individual is "the product of the tradition in which he stands, of the
solidary groups to which he belongs, of socialization and learning
processes to which he is exposed" (TCP II 135), he can also adopt a
critical attitude in which "only universal norms let themselves be dis-
tinguished as moral. ... [At the postconventional stage), the ego can no
longer identify with itself through particular roles and existing norms.
It has to take into account that the traditional accustomed forms of life
prove themselves as merely particular, as irrational; therefore it must
retract its identity, so to speak. behind the line of all particular roles
and norms ....

On Hegel's view, in contrast, embeddedness within
SUtlicbkeit means that there is never the possibility of moral disconnec-
tion. Freedom, for Hegel. is conformity to the universal as it is embed-
ded within and limited by the arbitrariness and contingency of
partkularity.
Gadamer's position is similar to Hegel's in this respect: particular-
istic traditions will always limit universal aspirations, rather than the
other way around. The hermeneutkal situation is always constrained by
the particular traditions that define the life of the interpreter. As Gadamer
puts it, "lllong before we understand ourselves through the process of
self-examination, we understand ourselves in a self-evident way in the
31. Hahenna.'. I>W F.ntu.>tcltJunR des /cb. died and In jerald Walluli. 7bt
Hermeneuttcs of life lllltrwy: Pvrwnal Acbteverrwnt and Hillary tn Gadamrr. llabwrntU.
and Hrlltson t!vaMion. IL: Northwestern Unlvetllily PrnA. 1990), p. Soc unlikr
view of phenomenokJ!Cial mfiJ(.1ion, for ttahrtmaA, on lhr prJile:unvrnCional lrvrl lhrft'
ia a "Jhifl in ftx"WI to a rdlrl1ivrly drvaJurd !tOI.ial world that ha. brrn "rapprd uf itll
natur .. ("jUIIicr and Solidariry. On thr Dt.'lUMeon Conc:rrmn11 () ." tr .. ,.
Shlrrry Wrhrr Nichul.rn. PbtkJtthtcol ll ( ICJM9-9(H, p. Thr mrthudui'I(Kal
dillccmnr<.1ion frnm thr lifeworld lnvulvn a di.'llinl1J<III hc1wrrn rhr prnc.rcluft' "' ,-,.IJ<JIIal
jullllficallm ul unlverul princ:lpln and rule. and thrir applic:atil 111 tu panic:uJar Jn'
On Jiahrnna.,. virw application involve lhr ul pnndplrll and Nlr alrady wppbru
by dilembedclrd julllllica1ory prrxedurn ol dilcunivr dcl'lr'!
rn annlic::.tlinn Lh:an In a nr.aclicr ul IJbrmtftU I wr lhid..
SHAUN GALU.GHF.R
family, society, and state in which we live. "H Critical reflection itself is
in every instance an interpretational practice. In the attempt to appeal
to transnational, universal rights, the interpreter is already bound up
within a particular system of national values, prejudices, and traditions.
One can only approach the universal from within the particular, but
without ever escaping the particular. Still, this does not make critique
impossible.
Foucault and the Possibility of Critical Hermeneutics
Habermas is puzzled about Foucault's evocation of Kant's essay What
is Enligbtenrrumt? He tries to place Foucault within the heritage of
critical theory, on a line that runs from Kant to the young Hegel, to
Marx and the young Hegelians, and through the Frankfurt School, a
path that delineates the project of modernity. But this is the line that
runs to Habermas himself, not to Foucault. From Haberrnas' perspec-
tive, it would be difficult to fit Foucault into the tradition of critical
theory, precisely because Foucault develops a critique of critical reason,
a critique of the Enlightenment, a critique of the very foundations of
critique, and is thus embroiled in a disabling contradiction.
What Foucault finds valuable in Kant's essay "What is Enltgbten-
ment?" is the form of the question:
What are we? in a very precise moment of history. Kant's question
appears as an analysis of both us and our present. I think that this
aspect of philosophy took on more and more importance. Hegel.
Nietzsche .... But the task of philosophy as a critical analysis of
our world is something which is more and more important. Maybe
the most certain of all philosophical problems is the problem of the
present time, and of what we are, in this very moment (SP 216).
Foucault follows Baudelaire, but in this does not escape Hegel, in
defining modernity as an attitude of "permanent critique of our histori-
cal e r a . " ~ ' Rather than supplying the answer in terms of its claim to
non-ideological politics, the Enlightenment requires that we critically
question the Enlightenment answer. The Enlightenment imposes itself
in the form of a question. This imposition is what Gadamer would call
an instance of historical effect, and according to Foucault, it orients
32. T1Uib and Method, p. 276.
33. Poucault, "Wh21 is l!nllghtenrnena," In 7be Poucaull Reader, ed. Paul RahlnoW
(New York: Pantheon Booka, 1984), p. 42; hereafter cited a11 WE.
164
Hegel, Foucault, and Critical Hermeneuttcs
critical analysis to the present time: "We must try to proceed with the
analysis of ourselves as beings who are historically determined, to a
certain extent, by the Enlightenment. Such an analysis implies a series
of historical inquiries .... oriented toward the 'contemporary limits of
the necessary', that is, toward what is not or is no longer indispensable
for the constitution of ourselves as autonomous subjects" (WE 43).
This is a line of critical theory that, in opposition to all of Habermas'
readings, I want to trace, perhaps only as a possibility, through the later
Hegel, Gadamer, and Foucault. Its starting point is not a universal
conception of power or an overarching conception of rationalism, as
one might find in the Frankfurt School, but a local analysis of different
processes in different fields.}! Critical hermeneutics puts claims to uni-
versality into question: it asks, "in what is given to us as universal,
necessary, obligatory, what place is occupied by whatever is singular,
contingent, and the product of arbitrary constraints?" (WE 45). In op-
position to Habermas, Foucault conceives of critique not as "the search
for formal structures with universal value, but rather as a historical
investigation into the events that have led us to constitute ourselves and
to recognize ourselves as subjects of what we are doing, thinking,
saying" (WE 46).
As a starting point, the present does not lead to consensus or to
a perfect future, but to the possibility of critical refusal. "Maybe the
target nowadays is not to discover what we are, but to refuse what we
are .... " (SP 216). Thus, Foucault suggests, critique takes the form of
"a possible transgression." As such, it does not promise universal con-
sensus, but local agonism, provocation, the possibility of struggle, the
possibility of refusal. Critical thought needs to be a 'constant checking,'
and the first order of business for this checking is the Hegelian mo-
ment: "We have to know the historical conditions which motivate our
conceptualization. We need a historical awareness of our present cir-
cumo;tance" (SP 209).
Critical hermeneutics involves struggle which is immediate in two
ways: it is struggle at a local level, and it is not oriented toward a
34. "I think the word r.atlonallzation is What we have to do analyze
specific rationalities rather than always Invoking the progress of rationalization in general.
Even If' the AujiiiAruns has been a very lrnponant phase in our history and in the
development of politi<:al technology, I think we have to refer to much more remote
If we want to under.itand how we have been trapped in our own hi.'llory. I
would like to suggest another way to go funher a new economy of power
a way which is more empirical. more dire<.1ly related to our Mtuation.
and which Implies more herween theory and practice. It am."-"-' of t:.lkinJl the
of resllllaoce aJC3lnlll different of power as a polnl." ( Fou<.-ault. SP
210-Zlll.
J6(j
SHAtiN GALUGHF.R
future. "In such struggles people criticize instances of power which are
the closest to them .... They do not look for the 'chief [remote) enemy',
but for the immediate enemy. Nor do they expect to find a solution to
their problem at a future date (that is, liberations, revolutions, end of
class struggle)" (SP 211). Thus, critical hermeneutics is motivated by
Olher than utopian energies: critique "must tum away from all projects
that claim to be global or radical. In fact we know from experience that
the claim to escape from the system of contemporary reality so as to
produce the overall programs of another society, of another way of
thinking, another culture, another vision of the world, has led only to
the return of the most dangerous traditions" (WE 46-47).
To give up the power of an ought that derives from an already
known universal, from the future already dreamed, is not to give up
the responsibility to act in response to existing conditions. We can act
with genuine responsibility only in the full knowledge that we do not
have an already-known universal or a complete right to or claim on the
future. In this context, individual judgments and the practices of con-
stitutional democracy are more ambiguous and unsure. In critical reflec-
tion informed by pbronesis, the situation is not made dear-cut, or black
and white, but is interpreted in shades of Hegel's and Foucault's favor-
ite color: grau, gris, gray.
35. l11is is cle-drly the motivation for Foucault's reservations about
project and his worry about its utopian tenor. See 7be Ftnal Foucault, eds. james
Bernauer and David Rasmussen (Cambridge: MIT Pres.o;, 1987), p. 18.
166
~ H e g e l , Histoty,
~ and Interpretation
edited l ~ r
Shaun Gallagher
C1997 Slate Untvemly of New York Press