Foucault’s Three Types of Powers

In this paper, I will examine One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest movie by Foucault’s concepts and thoughts. The first thing that comes to mind when watching the film is Michel Foucault. Because of his studies on various institutions (prisons, hospitals, mental hospitals, etc.) that maintain the modern social order and have enslaving systems. I have linked Foucault’s articles which are Panopticism and Body of condemned. According to Foucault, there are three types of powers which are punishment-based system, panoptic power, and plague power.

I will begin with the article panopticism. Accordingly, the fault person must be punished physically. Disciplining and controlling the person in this way is an old and still widespread type. When we go back to the movie, we are seeing that nurses and guards sometimes use physical force against patients if they try to resist or don’t follow the rules. In this way, using physical force, they seem to be trying to normalize them. Authority uses power to get them in line and authority wants them to follow what the rules say exactly. However, in modern society, this use of power has been replaced by “panoptic” power. For instance, in the pre-moral penal system; the penalty is doing ceremonial, is directed at the prisoner’s body, a ritual, and reestablished the authority and power of the king. However, in modern society, these kinds of things don’t apply. In the light of the Panopticon idea which belongs to Jeremy Bentham, the penalty and the control of the social system have changed. Panopticon is a kind of prison system. According to Bentham, prisoners in cells are lined up side by side around a tower which it is inside invisible. Prisoners always know that they are being watched through this tower, and they will avoid unwanted movements in social life by internalizing this fear of observation. I mean, if there is no guard in the tower but prisoners can’t know that fact. Hence, they thought there are guards that they are always watching them so prisoners can’t make any contrary moves. 

In the Panoptic prison system designed by Bentham, various light games are made invisible inside the tower. However, in modern society, it is changed various mechanisms such as the camera system, courts, police force, etc. envelop the individual and keep each movement under control. The film is an example of the panoptic force. The nurse is placed in the middle of the room, which is placed in the center to see all the patients in the clinic. Patients always knew that they were being supervised by nurses and staff, and they internalized the fear of surveillance. This panoptic power application is even more effective through cameras. They knew there will be consequences if they do unwanted behavior because the nurse’s eye was always on them. Nurse Ratched are representations of the eye of power and the representation is successfully performed. Nurse Ratched, as Foucault describes it, plays the role of authority that does not use violence, but constantly controls, observes, applies rules without compromise, and puts all individuals into a docile body format. Bromden describes nurse Ratched as Big Nurse because the nurse is no different from George Orwell's “Big Brother’. Big Nurse oversees all movements of McMurphy and others. Example scenes include: McMurphy teaches chief Bromden how to throw a basket, she followed and punished those who secretly gamble in the bathroom making you feel its presence. Patients also act and know that they are aware of the motive that they are being observed, whether they are aware or not. Another power application that supports panoptic power is what Foucault calls “plague power”. This system takes its name from keeping records of plague and leprosy patients in European societies starting from the Middle Ages and keeping them under control in separate houses. In modern society, individuals’ everything is recorded and every movement is monitored. For instance ID numbers, bank and credit cards, driving license, residence documents, and payroll can be observed in all kinds of movements and discourse you can easily follow through your records. In the one flew over the cuckoo’s nest also has detailed records and information of the patients in the clinic. Moreover, the weaknesses of the patients are known because of the therapy sessions. Nurse Ratched seems unsuccessful because she cannot make patients speak during group therapy. But nurse Ratched has actually achieved its goal; she makes all patients feel weak and sick individuals by repeatedly reminding them of their weaknesses. She also gives 'medicines that are beneficial to them' and s she wants them not to question, accompanied by loud music.

Foucault often mentions of the great confinement in his book the history of madness. He says as long as societies exist, there will certainly be non-societies, and they will be given various names and adjectives; they will be placed and classified in various social compartments that they have not chosen. Mad is one of these 'non-social' aspects because society needs it. He is a mad person for the relief of people and the proof of their existence. In the thought of Foucault, it is the exclusion of individuals and groups from the society who are opposed to discourse or acting differently from discourse, and their removal from free and social life with the stamps such as crazy, guilty, different, suspect, immoral, perverse and sick. When we look at the characters in the film, we see that many of the people who are stigmatized as mental patients do not have serious problems. Besides, when McMurphy found out, he really got surprised. For example, McMurphy is clearly a cheerful man who is clearly not already sick. However, the few months he spent in the hospital caused him even worse discomfort where he could cure him, and his right to his own body was taken away. He is an alive person so he can resist against discoursing. When he tried to resist, he got physical punishment – electroshock-. The time goes by; we can see that his mental and physical condition got worse. Although Billy has a mother phobia and self-esteem problem that can be solved easily, the treatment system tries to control it through these gaps rather than improving it. While the Chief character is able to recover in a short period of time thanks to the friendly approach of McMurphy, he has never reacted in the hospital for years and is known to all as deaf and dumb. Most of the patients stay voluntarily in the clinic, not in necessity. More importantly, instead of curing them, the hospital constantly reminds them that they are diseased and has an adverse effect on patients with its isolation effect from society. McMurphy cannot understand why others are staying in the clinic willingly and wants to get rid of this psychosis and show them that they are not crazy. They attempted rebellion against authority. His first attempts are for himself. Mute the music, not drink drugs, convince others to vote to watch baseball games, and try to lift the very heavy marble mass to escape. But McMurphy doesn't give up. He missed a bus and took his friends to go fishing. McMurphy has shown them that they are resourceful, powerful individuals and, therefore, gradually become dangerous for power. A consequence of this incident, the committee meets to determine whether McMurphy is crazy or not. But Nur Big Nurse does not allow it. Because Ratched has to prove that there is power in his place. Here, the relationship between space and power is striking. The Big “Nurse” borders want to experience the pleasure of being in power in a certain area and to substitute its shaken authority. McMurphy would never get out of the asylum unless nurse Rated wanted to then he did not escape even though he had the chance to escape many times. He tries to explain that the people in the asylum are actually tricked, drugged, intelligent individuals, and he was sacrificed for this cause. All these efforts will only benefit chief Bromden. The government succeeded in destroying all the mechanisms opposing it and disqualifying the threats. All the sick bodies in the system were gathered in madhouses and hospitals, not to be healed but to protect the health of the society and not to put the power at risk. In addition, McMurphy was also neutralized, everyone else in their old roles, and chief Bromden returned to the native land of an Indian, reproducing himself with the system “stick” madhouse.

Foucault, who alleges that power is everywhere, states that this results from that the power comes from every place, but not from that the power covers every place. In this context, the power is not an organization, a structure or a particular power owned by someones, but is a name given to a sophisticated situation in a community. On the other hand, power is any obtained or lost thing, but is a structure that exits from an unlimited number of points and runs among unequal and movable connections. These connections are not in a position of a superstructure having a simple punishment or maintenance role. They play a productive role directly, where they exist.

References

1. Becermen, M. (2018). An Inquiry on Relation among Discourse, Truth and Power in Michel Foucault, DOI: 10.20981
2. Foucault, M. (2008). 'Panopticism' from 'Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison'. Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts, 2(1), 1-12.
3. Foucault, M. (1993a). Cinselligin Tarihi I, Trans. Hulya Tufan, Istanbul: Afa Yayinlari
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6. Vitkus , D. (1994). Madness and Misogyny in Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest. Journal of Comparative Poetics, No. 14, pp. 64-90