The Merits of Power: Post structuralist Derrida vs Foucalt

In considering the merits of power in the applied theories by post-structuralists Jaques Derrida and Michel Foucault, I would argue that Derrida's deconstruction is the more superior in relation to power in communication.

Derrida's deconstruction has been described as a "difficult process"(The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand, 2007,p 60) or theory to define.

My perspective on an exact meaning of deconstruction is that it is all but impossible to describe deconstruction in a satisfactory way. The whole idea of deconstruction is that words are signs and have different contextual meanings. If a word or "sign is defined by it's absence or what is not said", and "there is always an element that can never be filled" (The Open Polytechnic, 2007,p 61), then it must be almost impossible to give an exact definition.

The fact that a definition is hard to supply , I would propose could therefore be deconstruction's proof of its own hypothesis. In the film "Derrida, the father of deconstruction" (Kofman,2004), Derrida himself said, "the very condition of deconstruction may be at work, in the work, within the system to be deconstructed. It may already be located there, already at work.

Those who are able to apply deconstruction are able to gain maximum power by influencing, for example the ideology of Gramsci's proletariate who are ruled by consent. Consider the ruling elite of a society who wish to close the gap between male and female roles. If one removes man, then there is no woman and we are left with "people", which has no power ethic or symbol associated with the term. Therefore it is possible to state that all people are equal.

Because "writing is crucial to generating meaning in speech" (Barker, 2002, p. 19), deconstruction can be used to create many /any meaning. This is because deconstruction can be used to present an argument or ideology through omission or binary inclusion of its opposite. If the same ruling elite wished the proletariate to adehere to the ideology that women are better employees than men, they could state:

"Women can multi-task, therefore they achieve more than men." The opposite would be : "Men cannot multi-task therefore they achieve less than women." This highlights what is not being said . If I say "women are more efficient because they can multi-task", what I am not saying, but is implied, is that "men are inefficient because they cannot multi-task".

Another example of putting across a message by contextual opposites is as follows: Take the statement : "A SUV was involved in a fatal accident with a saloon car".
Remove the distinction of SUV and its opposite, Saloon and all you have is CAR. This will read as "There was a fatal car accident".

To stop SUVs being driven , one could , though gentle persuasion belabour the opposites in the context of the above example . I submit that the eventual cultural norm would probably read something like this: "SUVs cause deaths therefore the proletariate agree with the ruling elite that driving saloons is more acceptable."

Basically deconstruction can be used to present an arguement or idea/ideology through the use of signs and omission or inclusion of its opposite, which can change the context.

Deconstruction is not simply a "technique". It is a recognition that meaning cannot be fixed. Through the use of decontruction I believe text can be made to mean anything one could wish for. Therein lies great power in communcating in this way.

In comparison, Foucault in his later years, held that power was a technique that could be learned and applied. Faucault's discourse ,which was supposed to "regulate" (Barker, 2002, p. 20), who has the power to speak and what could be spoken of, was based on historical studies. However, there have been questions asked about the validitiy and the principles of honesty that Faucoult used to base his theory upon.

One of the most scathing examples of this is found in the article "The fictions of Foucault's scholarship", where Scull says " the ease with which history can be distorted, facts ignored, the claims of human reason disparaged and dismissed, by someone (Foucault) sufficiently cynical and shameless, andwilling to trust in the ignorance and the credulity of his customers (Scull, 2007).

Yet another recent critic states "factual errors and textual misreadings pose a real problem for Foucault if he intends his works to have any credibility or claims to be offering better interpretations of modernity than other accounts" (Best, 1995).

Given that there have been many accusations of inaccuracies over the years, I believe I cannot argue for the strength of anything Foucault may present, when comparing his theories to those of Derrida.

References:
Barker, C. (2002). Foundations of cultural studies. In Cultural studies: Theory and practice (pp. 18-22). London: Sage Publications.
Best, S. (1995). The politics of historical vision: Marx, Foucault, Habermas. New York: Guilford Press.
Kofman, A. Z. (Producer), & Dick, K. (Director). (2002). Derrida. The father ofdeconstruction [Motion picture]. United States: Zeitgeist flims. Retrieved January 16, 2008, from http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7347615341871798222&q=Derrida&total=307&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0 Scull, A. (2007, March 21). The fictions of Foucault's scholarship [Review ofthe book History of madness]. The times literary supplement, para 20.Retrieved January 18, 2008, from http://tls.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25347-2626687,00.html
The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand. (2008). Module 1:Beyond Structuralism. In 72145 Introduction to human communication. Lower Hutt, New Zealand.
Bibliography:
Reference section. (n.d.). Marxist internet archive. Retrieved January 19, 2008,from http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/fr/ foucaul2.htm
Michel Foucault. (n.d.). Theory. Org. Retrieved January 18, 2008, fromhttp://theory.org.uk/ctr-fou1.htm