Foucault’s concept of governmentality goes beyond the narrow limits of state power to look at how these societies employ more subtle methods of power exercised through a network of institutions, practices, procedures and techniques which act to regulate social conduct. This approach is now gaining influence in International Relations and this piece reflects on this emerging field and tries to steer the debate in a certain direction. It is concerned to explore the limitations of the concept as a social theoretical explanation and also as an account of the international domain. It suggests that because the international domain is highly uneven, governmentality can only usefully be applied to those areas that might be characterized as having an advanced form of liberalism. To explain these limits requires that governmentality be set within a wider theorization of social context.
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