2 research outputs found
Foucault and the origins of the disciplined subject : post-subjectivity as a condition for transformation in education
Background: The need for transforming South African education can ultimately be traced to a
form of Western subjectivity which dominated Europe since the classical age (1600–1750). The
notions of ‘discipline’ and ‘subjectivity’ suggest distinct associations with repressive regimes
like apartheid, and the present article will argue that the assumptions behind apartheid
education cannot be understood without understanding the still more foundational
assumptions – taken as axiom – underlying Western subjectivity. This conception of subjectivity
underlies the ‘disciplined society’ and its concomitant ethos of expansion, ranging from its
colonial projects to the rise of the human sciences. As a result, it is of considerable value for the
South African educational environment to consider Michel Foucault’s unmasking of the
interplay between subjectivity, truth and power, and to explore the possibilities offered by
Foucault’s own ethic of transgression.
Aim: Drawing on Michel Foucault’s genealogy of the modern subject and archaeologies of
modern knowledge, it will be demonstrated that the process of transformation of higher
education in South Africa not only provides the opportunity to tend to a grave historical
injustice, but also to develop a critique of modernist educational practices of the West and thus
to cultivate its own educational ethos as a more just and authentic South African alternative.
Setting: South African Higher Education in the 21st century.
Methods: Foucauldian–Nietzschean genealogy, in the spirit of Foucault’s own use of Nietzsche:
‘The only valid tribute to thought such as Nietzsche’s is precisely to use it, to deform it, to
make it groan and protest’.
Result: A re-considered and reconfigured notion of educational identity beyond the confines
of modernist Western subjectivity.
Conclusion: While full justice can never be done to the full horrors of the past, the process of
transformation in education may provide an opportunity to not only address injustices in the
past, but also to create a new African educational ethic which may contribute something truly
new to the world’s educational heritage
Does meaning matter? Nietzsche, Jung and implications for global leadership
The Global Risks 2035 Update by the Atlantic Council, despite its clinical focus on economic,
environmental and security challenges, nevertheless suggests that shared global meaning
might have a role to play in enabling humanity to set off on a more beneficial trend for its
foreseeable global future. The realisation that the complex challenges facing humanity is
existential as much as it is pragmatic necessitates trans-disciplinary engagement and
collaborative research ventures. This article contributed a trans-disciplinary reflection by
bringing philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and psychologist-philosopher Carl Jung in dialogue
with critical leadership studies within the broader framework of the science–religion dialogue
of this special volume. Pointing to the awareness in leadership studies of how meaning,
narrative and shared vision enable greater effectiveness and collaboration, we explore nihilism
as cultural problem to be addressed in order to create meaning that fosters global collaborative
action. From the viewpoint of the Global Risk 2035 Update and its gloomy strategic foresight
of a newly bipolarised world or further descent into chaos, the article brought Nietzsche’s idea
of the Last Man into dialogue with Carl Jung’s emphasis on the need for a collective myth to
reverse the decline of civilisation and enable humanity to chart a course towards unprecedented
global collaboration.
CONTRIBUTION : The article contributes from a transdisciplinary perspective to the question of
meaning in leadership. Drawing from the contributions of Nietzsche and Jung, it argues that
shared myth and shared meaning is vital to address the complex global challenges that
leadership is called to address. This philosophical reflection on the crisis of nihilism contributes
to the growing awareness in critical leadership studies that meaning-making is critical to
effective leadership.http://www.hts.org.zaam2022Business Managemen