Foucault on Addiction as a Social Phenomenon — Government, Confession, Biopolitics

Teaser

~~Before diving into fieldwork,~~ I’m taking stock of Michel Foucault and the governmentality tradition to ask how “addiction” gets constituted as a problem, managed as a risk, and lived as a practice of the self. This reading pays special attention to Histoire de la folie, Discipline and Punish, and The History of Sexuality, and then extends to followers and heirs who help us grasp addiction as a governed and confessed relation to self and population.

Why Foucault for addiction?

Foucault urges us to shift from “what addiction is” to how it became thinkable—through discourses, practices, and institutions that make certain truths actionable. Read this way, addiction emerges at the intersection of clinic, court, charity, market, and media—produced and governed rather than merely discovered. See Foucault’s genealogies of madness (1961/64), discipline (1975), and sexuality (1976–) for the template of such problematizations. Foucault, 1961/1972/2013; Foucault, 1975/1977; Foucault, 1976/1978. (Gallimard)

Three pillars for reading addiction

1) Madness, exclusion, and the medical gaze

Histoire de la folie shows how categories like “madness” get sorted, excluded, and later medicalized—a path that illuminates the shifting borders between “vice,” “disease,” and “risk” in addiction. Foucault, 1961/1972/2013. (Gallimard)
Naissance de la clinique / Birth of the Clinic gives us the clinical gaze, which renders bodies and behaviors visible, measurable, and intervenable (AUDIT scores, DSM checklists, biomarkers). Foucault, 1963/1973. (Wikipedia)

2) Discipline, normalization, compliance

Discipline and Punish helps us read treatment centers, drug courts, and some rehabs as disciplinary environments: surveillance, routines, normalizing judgment, reward/sanction regimes. Foucault, 1975/1977. (Penguin)

3) Biopolitics, risk, and populations

The History of Sexuality and the Collège de France lectures on Security, Territory, Population show how modern states govern through risk, statistics, and life processes—the core of addiction epidemiology, harm reduction, and pricing/availability policies. Foucault, 1976; Foucault, 1977–78/2007. (Penguin)

Confession and the technologies of the self

Foucault’s analyses of confession (Vol. I of History of Sexuality) and later writings on self-techniques let us see intake interviews, relapse-prevention plans, and mutual-aid testimonies as truth-producing practices that shape responsible, self-managing subjects—without reducing them to manipulation. Foucault, 1976/1978; Foucault, 1988. (PenguinRandomhouse.com)

Lines of descent: followers, readers, and allies

Nikolas Rose: from “psy” disciplines to the neurochemical self, addiction becomes a matter of responsibilized self-regulation under expert and market logics. Rose, 2003; Rose, 2007. (nikolasrose.com)
Ian Hacking: “making up people”—classifications interact with persons to create looping kinds; the label “addict” is stabilized institutionally and then lived. Hacking, 1999; Hacking, 1986. (Harvard University Press)
Mariana Valverde: alcohol as will—a long history of governing freedom and culpability; the pendulum between compassion and blame. Valverde, 1998. (Cambridge University Press & Assessment)
Mitchell Dean; Peter Miller & Nikolas Rose: risk, prudentialism, audits and governing through freedom (harm-reduction, MUP, KPIs). Dean, 1999/2010; Miller & Rose, 2008. (Sage Publications)
Suzanne Fraser & David Moore: drug policy as biopolitical assemblage, decentering simple cause stories. Fraser & Moore, 2011. (Cambridge University Press & Assessment)
Natasha Dow Schüll: Addiction by design—engineered machine gambling environments that capture attention and time; a bridge to digital compulsions. Schüll, 2012. (natashadowschull.org)
Gilles Deleuze: “control societies” extend Foucault: from enclosed institutions to ambient modulation (useful for platform-era addictions). Deleuze, 1990/1992. (faculty.umb.edu)

A dialogue with rational choice (in honor of Norman Braun)

From Norman Braun I learned to model drug use as locally rational under constraints (prices, availability, peers, stress)—a diagnosis, not a eulogy, of rationality. Coupled with Foucault, we can ask who builds those constraints, which truths authorize them, and how subjects are formed to choose. Braun’s monograph remains a touchstone for integrating sociological and economic reasoning about drugs. Braun, 2002/2014 reprint. (De Gruyter Brill)

Working propositions for empirical research

Problematizations move: trace shifts (vice → disease → risk → neurochemical self).
Apparatus mapping: clinics, courts, pharmacies, platforms as a dispositif formatting conduct.
Confessional economies: how assessment tools and testimonies produce truth and allocate responsibility.
Security vs. discipline: when do we govern populations (harm reduction, MUP) vs. bodies (punitive containment)?
Technologies of the self: diaries, tracking, mutual aid as ethical practices of sobriety/safer use.

Method note (Grounded Theory)

As in my other projects, I proceed in Grounded Theory mode (memoing, coding, constant comparison). Each post is a public memo; the outline will grow with the project as concepts stabilize or shift.

AI co-author disclosure

I work with an AI co-author for outlining, synthesis, and drafting; I remain responsible for the final selection, verification, and argument. Any generative vignettes will be marked [HYPOTHESIS].

Literature & Links (APA)

Braun, N. (2002). Rationalität und Drogenproblematik. De Gruyter Oldenbourg. Publisher page. (De Gruyter Brill)
Dean, M. (1999/2010). Governmentality: Power and rule in modern society (2nd ed.). SAGE. Publisher page. (Sage Publications)
Deleuze, G. (1992). Postscript on the societies of control. October, 59, 3–7. PDF. (faculty.umb.edu)
Foucault, M. (1961/1972/2013). Histoire de la folie à l’âge classique. Gallimard. Publisher page. (Gallimard)
Foucault, M. (1963/1973). The birth of the clinic. Vintage. Overview. (Wikipedia)
Foucault, M. (1975/1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison. Vintage / Penguin. PRH page · Penguin UK. (PenguinRandomhouse.com)
Foucault, M. (1976/1978). The history of sexuality, Vol. 1. Penguin/PRH. PRH page · Penguin UK. (PenguinRandomhouse.com)
Foucault, M. (1977–78/2007). Security, territory, population: Lectures at the Collège de France. Palgrave Macmillan. Publisher page. (Macmillan Publishers)
Foucault, M. (1988). Technologies of the self. In L. H. Martin, H. Gutman, & P. H. Hutton (Eds.), Technologies of the self. UMass Press. Publisher page. (University of Massachusetts Press)
Fraser, S., & Moore, D. (2011). The drug effect: Health, crime and society. Cambridge University Press. Publisher page. (Cambridge University Press & Assessment)
Hacking, I. (1999). The social construction of what? Harvard University Press. Publisher page. (Harvard University Press)
Hacking, I. (1986). Making up people. In T. Heller et al. (Eds.), Reconstructing Individualism. Stanford University Press. Archive note · PDF. (discoverarchives.library.utoronto.ca)
Keane, H. (2002). What’s wrong with addiction? NYU Press. Publisher page. (NYU Press)
Miller, P., & Rose, N. (2008). Governing the present: Administering economic, social and personal life. Polity. Distributor page (Wiley/Polity). (Wiley)
Rose, N. (2003). Neurochemical selves. Society, 41(1), 46–59. Author page · Springer. (nikolasrose.com)
Rose, N. (2007). The politics of life itself. Princeton University Press. Author (PUP). (nikolasrose.com)
Schüll, N. D. (2012). Addiction by design: Machine gambling in Las Vegas. Princeton University Press. Author page. (natashadowschull.org)

Prüfprotokoll (Validation)

Status: Enriched v2.0 (links added).
Checks: Publisher-first links for Foucault, governmentality authors, and Braun’s rational choice monograph.
Next steps: append a short empirical vignette [HYPOTHESIS] on confession in intake interviews.
Date: 25 Oct 2025

Sociology of Addiction