From Positivity to Apparatus/ Agamben

If "positivjty" is the name that, according to Hyppolite, the young Hegel gives to the historical element loaded as it is with rules, rites, and institutions that are imposed on the individual by an external power, but that become, so to speak. internalized in the systems of beliefs and feelings then Foucault, by borrowing this term (later to become "apparatus"), takes a position with respect to a decisive problem, which is actually also his own problem : the rclation between individuals as living beings and the historical element. By "the historical element," I mean the set of institutions, of processes of subjectification and of rules in which power relations become concrete. Foucault's ultimate aim is not, then as in Hegel, the reconciliation of the two elements; it is not even to emphasize their conflict. For Foucault, what is at stake is rather the investigation of concrete modes in which the positivities (or the apparatuses) act within the relations, mechanisms, and "plays" of power.

(What is an Apparatus?, 6)

If we now try to examine the definition of "apparatus" that can be found in common French dictionaries, we see that they distinguish between three meanings of the term:

a. A strictly juridical sense: "Apparatus is the part of a judgment that contains the decision separate from the opinion." That is the section of a sentence that decide. or the enacting clause of a law.

b. A technological meaning: "The way in which the parts of a machine or of a mechanism and by extension the mechanism itself are arranged."

c. A military use: "The set of means arranged in conformity with a plan."

(What is an Apparatus?, 7)