About the psychology

In this blog i will try to show a view about the arisen of psychology as a discipline using the statements of Foucault about the power. I have chosen this matter because I see as fundamental the understanding of conditions of arisen of our discipline (The psychology) to be able to face the views of normalization and clasification of people.

First, Foucault doesn't understand power as something one has or not (like He Man: "I have the power"), but as something it is executed. For him, historically there are different ways to execute the power or different structures of power, on the one hand sovereignty power corresponding to monarchy and on the other, disciplinary power, which corresponds to modern state. But, is more important  understand disciplinary power, where we are right now and understand how it is related with psychology.


To explain disciplinary power, Foucault uses a panopticon analogy. Panopticon then would be a construction, a building, that allows to make visible the behaviour of all subjects from a central point of this institution, but they (the subjects) don´t know if they are observed or not,  because, in the exact middle of the prison, there is a watchtower that illuminates the cells that surround this central building. This light blind subjects, not letting them know if there is someone in the tower

For Foucault we function in a society that reproduces that function of omnivicibility and omnicontrol. In this way, the objective of disciplinary power is that each subject inside the system takes control of himself. The effect generated by this, is that there is no need for guardians in the control tower, it is enough that the tower exists to make the subjects regulate themselves.

Here we reach main point, which is that disciplinary power doesn' t need to observe what the subject thinks, only sees the behavior. An abnormal behavior means an abnormal psyche. Then, it is understood that if disciplinary power performs this operation, that psychology played and crucial role for the creation of this type of power, becasue psychology is installed with a knowledge and a group of techniques about psyche, about mind.

Weell, this, bye bye...