This post is a review of concepts/theories necessary for a better understanding of the dialectics of power, knowledge, and discourse in our “modern” world. It also aims at helping us grapple with what is going on in the Middle East namely the Arab Spring which is approached from Western perspective.
Review: “The West and the Rest: Discourse and Power” by Stuart Hall (in Race and Racialization, 2007, Canadian Scholar Press, pp56-60)
In this article, Stuart Hall examines “the formation of the languages or “discourses” in which Europe began to describe itself and the “others” it encountered in the course of its expansion” (56). The western discourse in question manifests itself through a variety of ways/meanings. Thus Stuart Hall deems it necessary, at first, to unpack the word ‘discourse’ itself.
What is a “discourse”?
According to Stuart Hall, “a discourse is a group of statements which provide a language for talking about –i.e. a way of representing—a particular kind of knowledge about a topic. When statements about a topic are made within a particular discourse, the discourse makes it possible to construct the topic in a certain way. It also limits the other ways in which the topic can be constructed”(56). So a discourse is not monolithic but rather it is composed of interrelated elements/statements that form what Michel Foucault qualifies as “discursive formation”.
To fully grasp the discursive aspects of a discourse, Hall fleshes out three points:
1-A discourse can be produced from a variety of positions (an individual, a family, a nation etc.)And its “coherence” is, in no way” affected by such positions. Discourses are positions which make them make sense.
2-“Discourses are not closed systems”, by this Hall means a “discourse of Europe” can be heavily influenced by that of earlier “Christendom”. So if we look carefully in the current western discourse we may find traces of the past that underlie it.
3-The different elements that form a discourse are not necessarily identical but they “must” be related in a “regular” and “systematic” way, not at random though. Foucault refers to this as “system of dispersion”.
Discourse and ideology
A discourse is similar to an ideology but they are not interchangeable because “ideology is based on a distinction between true statements about the world (science) and false statements (ideology), and the belief that the facts about the world help us to decide between true and false statements”(56). However—according to Hall—Foucault maintains that the “fact” alone are not enough in determining truth or falsehood because the very language we use “interferes”. To illustrate this, Hall states that the Palestinians “fighting” for their land can be referred in two ways: (a) freedom fighters (b) terrorists. Here only the fact/fighting is established, and meaning will depend on what we make of it. If we chose either construction, it can be “true” (scientific) or “false”(ideology). These two are related in terms of power dynamics and whichever is uttered from a more powerful position takes over. In other words, power produces knowledge.
Can a Discourse be “innocent”?
Could the western discourse be dissociated from power? Could it be “true”/scientific? Is it based on interest?
When Europe met the New World the discourse could not be “neutral” or “innocent”, because of their cultural influence, their ability to represent it and—of course—their interests. However, such interests could be contradicting one another; as such what Europe said about the New World may not have been motivated by mere interests. The discourse of Europe and the New World was characterized by power relationship and Europe was in the dominant position. So, discourse is interrelated to power.
It is one of the systems through which power circulates. The knowledge which a discourse produces constitutes a kind of power, exercised over those who are “known.” When that knowledge is exercised in practice, those who are “known” in a particular way will be subject (i.e. subjected) to it. This is always a power relation. Those who produce the discourse also have the power to make it true—i.e. to enforce its validity, its scientific status. (57-58)
Representing “the other”
The discourse of “the West and the Rest” is characterized by what Foucault calls “regime of Truth” as it “is effective, organizing and regulating relations of power” (58). For Hall, Edward Said’s Orientalism can illustrate Foucault’s notion of “regime of truth”. Orientalism is a discourse produced by the West on “the orient”. Quoted by Hall, Said states that “without examining orientalism as a discourse, one cannot possibly understand the enormously systematic discipline by which European culture was able to manage—and even produce—the orient politically, sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively during the post enlightenment period.”(58).
The “archive”
What is the library/bibliography of the discourse of “the West and the Rest”? In other word, what is the foundation of western discourse? To deal with this interrogation, Hall identifies four major sources on which the discourse drew:
1-classical knowledge: Early European thinkers and explorers tended to fantasize about what existed in the outer world. They believed that paradise was located somewhere on earth. Even no later than the 18th century, they were “still debating whether what they had discovered in the pacific was a paradise”(59).
2-Religious and biblical sources: Europeans reinterpreted geography in terms of the bible which sets Jerusalem as center of the world.
3-Mythology: There is no a big difference between religious, classical discourses and that of mythology.
4-Traveler’s tales: as one “the most fertile source of information” travelers’ tales is also very influenced by the aforementioned sources.
In a nutshell, a whole body of astounding mixture of knowledge served to describe and rationalize the encounter/”the other” so that it can fit in to the language of “home”. The discourse embedded in “the west and the rest” is still up-to-date. It sometimes manifests itself through racial and/or ethnic superiority. It is carried on in new forms of language.
