Abstract

This article reflects upon the notion of biopower deriving from Paul Rabinow’s work French DNA. This book undertakes an analysis of the relations between biotechnologies analysis of the relation between biotechnologies and bioethics in France informed by Foucault’s concept of biopower. We can retain two theses from this account: biotechnologies pluralise biopower and take it to the limit towards beings situated at the limits of life; bioethics fails to constitute a biopolitics because it is a discourse of sacralisation and not one of resistance. Beyond these two theses, we must apply the concept of biopower to recent transformations in the sciences of life