A Foucauldian Study of Spanish Colonialism

Abstract

This article studies sixteenth‐century Spanish colonialism solely through the lens of Foucauldian thought, using his method of genealogy to return to the debate over the indigenous' capacity for reason, and his method of archeology to assess the positive systems of law and economics, particularly the law of nations, that were formulated in response to the problems of conquest and settlement. It also offers an alternative to Foucault's own history of raison d'État, showing that its foundations of Christian pastoral discipline, police, and diplomacy, rather than rising in opposition to the Spanish Crown and the Church, defined Spain's colonial order.