Discourse, genealogy, social theory and a society in transition: The challenge facing the human sciences

Abstract

Abstract This article is predicated on the belief that descriptivist or positivistic approaches in the human sciences are inadequate in dealing with a social reality which cannot be divorced from structures of domination and asymmetrical power relations of various kinds. What is needed is a ‘theoretical praxis’ that is capable of changing social reality in a potentially emancipatory manner even as it illuminates them. For this reason the paper concentrates on certain aspects of Foucault's work because, as in the case of social theory, it opposes domination and simultaneously enables emancipatory empowerment. Hence, the potential of specific insights on the part of Foucault to provide a ‘theoretical’ compass and, simultaneously, a model for human or social scientific practice is explored. The argument further entails the claim that the social/ human world that Foucault enables one to engage with, in an effort to formulate and activate the intelligible conditions of possible changes, is necessarily highly s...