Toxicity at the Equidistance of Biotechnology and Biopolitics

(Short paper)

Keywords: Toxicity, biotechnology, biopolitics, Foucault, Heidegger, bio art, phenomenology, Enframing, bio-society, apparatus.

The paper looks into how “Toxicity” entrenches itself into what Phenomenology sees as the co-constitution of society and technology. The cultural deciphering of the toxic societal terrain resonates with current socio-economic global transformations. The topic of toxicity reconstructs the current environmental situation and socio-political contexts by looking into modes of contemporary cultural and technological production. Biopolitics maintains an extended role today by shaping life and attaining central role in society. It adds a complexity of layers that allows radical reconstruction of relations between politics and nature, allowing for a reassessment of how we look at life today. The trajectory of development of Biopolitics is altered, for life appears not to be what we have originally assumed that it was, and therefore its regulation cannot continue under previously granted premises. The dualities of power and right, sovereignty and law, do not leave the contemporary Biopolitical discourses for a minute. The Bio-political characteristics of Toxicity are seen by some in line with eugenics, as the toxins will most certainly lead to sterility of the indigenous population, and are to be seen in correlation with the degenerative pathology of the prevailing illnesses such as alcoholism, STDs, obesity, diabetes, cancer, etc.