Governing To‐day: Towards an Analytics of the Contemporary

Governing To-day denotes a domain of research, and what the thesis undertakes is a theoretical discussion of some questions of method vis-à-vis researching this domain. There are two aspects to the title that enfold one another.
Firstly, “governing to-day” signposts that it is to!day that is to be governed, that it is ourselves in our actuality that form the target of government, hence it is this government of ourselves in our present that we are to enquire into.
Secondly, “governing to-day” highlights the fact that it is thus the state of contemporary arts of government, government at this moment in time, in the present!day, in this time that is our own, and so forth, that forms the object of enquiry. Accordingly, “governing to!day” denotes both a government of the present and government in the present. In working through said questions of method, the thesis sketches out an approach that takes as its reference point and means of critique the “will not to be governed like that”. Consequently, the approach thus outlined is firmly situated within that rather loosely affiliated body of work that goes under the title studies in governmentality. Studies in governmentality have their point of departure in the research and writing of the French philosopher and historian, Michel Foucault. It is primarily within the writings of Foucault that the thesis seeks to find a workaround to the problem thrown forth by the aforementioned questions of method.