The meta-physics of Foucault’s ethics: Succeeding where Levinas fails

Abstract

This essay aims to critically assess the later Foucault’s ethical turn by using Levinas’s ethical metaphysics as critical yardstick. Foucault’s notion of ethical subjectivity constitutes a site of resistance against externally imposed subjugating subject identities. Apart from a practice of freedom, Foucault also insists that it engenders the subject with a generous responsiveness towards others.