When Reality Comes Knocking at Your Discourse: Foucauldian Notions of a “Fourth Industrial Revolution”

ABSTRACT Michel Foucault has put forward a number of concepts, notably “the imaginary”, “discursive formation” and “dispositif”, that have been used by various writers to understand the “fourth industrial revolution” (4IR). This article suggests that such concepts in his early writing (1954–1975) are misleading because they entail the idea that the 4IR is a discourse that acquires “materiality” only to the extent that it is enunciated in various human and social practices. The article goes on to argue that the later Foucault (1976–1980) presents us with much better, realist concepts that help us to understand that “the 4IR” is actually a hyperbolic ideology that perpetuates the myth that we currently live in a 4IR. Various examples of the use of these Foucauldian concepts in these different ways in relation to the 4IR are offered as the argument develops.