Referencia completa: Vázquez García, Francisco: «Ambivalencias de Bentham en la lectura de Foucault», Telos. Revista Iberoamericana de Estudios Utilitaristas, vol.I, 2 (1992) (SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA), pp. 81-90

Undoubtly, Foucault’s reading on Bentham’s work has left its mark on the contemporary reception of the Scottish philosopher. According to benthami- tes, Foucault might have deformed ~exclusively being founded on a slanting interpretation of The Panopticon- the image of Bentham; thought identified with the ideological embryo of modern totalitarisms. Confronted with this simplification of the clash between Foucault and Bentham, this paper in- tends to show: a) that the French philosopher is not a historian of philosophy, he does not try to work out Bentham’s true thought; he just points out the conditions of possibility of a utopia materialized in the panoptical machi- nery; b) that Foucault’s reading is ambivalent; Bentham appears as one of the pioneers of the modern social engineering, but also-in texts which are less well-known than Discipline an Punishment- like one of the most signifi- cant critics of punishment and the techniques of State control in the Ancien Régime. Bentham’s ambivalence, brought forward by Foucault, is not an ex- ception; it is the echo of the duplicities that define the typical ethos of the Enlightment.

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