EGENIS seminar series: "Public Health, Biopolitics, Security", Ariane Hanemaayer (Brandon University, Canada)

I operationalize Foucault’s conceptualization of security apparatus following three indices: the insertion of population health “key targets” within a series of probable events drawing on epidemiological knowledge; the governability of these elements within an economic calculation of cost; and the establishment of an average or norm that must not be exceeded (cf. Foucault 2007:6). These processes aim to establish a definition of risk for particular cases, such as HIV and smoking, to identify what is dangerous, and then deploy technologies of power to predict, modify, and correct those health crises that deviate from the norm. Security tends to intervene through natural rather than artificial mechanisms. I explain how health promotion programs exist at this intersection between security apparatus and biopolitics. My analysis offers a new analytic diagram for understanding the assemblage of different elements in the maintenance of contemporary health care: the mortality of the population, health promotion programs of conduct, and the effects and failures of health security.