Psychic life of power

Psychic Life of Power is a fairly ambitious attempt by author Judith Butler to identify and contextualize the germination of power and dominion as it relates to individual people. This work is largely based upon a number of conceptions of the self and social issues of power as propagated by pioneers within the field of sociology and psychology, including Michael Foucalt, Friedrich Nietzsche, and George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Although many of the key points within this work are founded upon principles elucidated by the aforementioned scholars, the ingenuity and the true value of Butler's book lies in its numerous points that are at variance with the perspectives presented by the aforementioned figures, who may widely be considered his colleagues in this particular field (especially Foucalt).

One of the fundamental tenets of The Psychic Life of Power is the fact that the author posits that power is not simply an internal construct that exists within individuals, but that it is rather an external force which has an external origin. The nature of that origin is widely perceived to be from society, as illustrated through its numerous conventions and norms of behavior. Interestingly enough, the author contends that such external forms of power engendered by society constitute a large degree of the very formation of an individual, an idea that has numerous ramifications of considerable significance. For instance, this belief of Butler's contends that the existence and general idea of a person actually stems from his or her subjugation to this external force which is the power produced by society.

Furthermore, within this manuscript Butler asserts that the very nature of power, and its products -- in this case that which may be considered the psychic self of an individual -- is fabricated in an artificial form. Therefore, the author believes that there is a contrived element to someone's psyche, which is largely based upon the fact that it stems from social power. What is interesting about this particular assertion is the relationship between the psyche of the individual and the power that spawned it. In several references in The Psychic Power of Life, the author refers to the production of an individual's psyche as an "ambivalent" effect of power -- which of course means that such an effect is not the intended purpose of power, and that people's psyche's are therefore subject to a degree of flexibility and variation since they are merely the bi-product of something inherently larger. This particular belief also points to the nature of the social source of power, which Butler alternately refers to as both concealed and reinforced by the psyches which it is responsible for creating.