Rethinking a concept of political subjectivity on the case of the Slovak penal policy reform

This paper deals with the concept of biopower and biopolitics developed in works of Michel Foucault and Giorgio Agamben, applied to the recent proposal of the dramatic change of the penal policy in Slovakia. In the pre-modern society, the power operated from the top down. When criminal behaviour disrupted order and sovereign power was challenged, an execution symbolically re-established order. However, in modern times, the power experienced a change from scaffolding a body to disciplining a soul. The goal has become a stable, disciplined, efficient, and regulated population that creates appropriate conditions for social stability. Biopower distributes the bodies within the system due to the system’s needs. With the emergence of capitalism, the human body came to be seen as a working instrument. Capitalism became a perfect system that furthered efficacy and created political subjects. Every individual has been directly or indirectly forced to cooperate. The subject that disrupts or does not fulfill social cooperation is put aside or re-educated. However, we may observe a change in the paradigm. It seems that it is not anymore the obedient subject that is the goal. As an object of the analysis will serve the current development in Slovakia. The newly elected government in Slovakia proposed a change in the state's penal policy. The reform changes the penal code so that first-time offenders would not face imprisonment for any economic crime, regardless of the financial damage done. Irrespective of the damage, the minimal custodial penalty does not exceed four years. The upper limit of four years is also the new limit for the applicability of the suspension of the imprisonment sentence. Moreover, the judge will have a duty to consider alternative sentences before imprisonment, while the fine will be a financial penalty that will be applicable up to three million EUR. Furthermore, most offenses against the property will be limited from criminal proceedings five years after being committed. The surprising element is that the administration, which claims to be conservative and inclined to authoritarianism, proposes liberation of the penal policy. It is also a new kind of penal populism and a change of rhetoric when the administration leaves the fight against corruption while lowering the punishments for criminal activity. The consequences of these changes will be dramatic. However, from the point of social science, this shift in the state's penal policy is an exciting issue. While the government promises financial benefits for the state from criminal activity, experts are frightened about the growth of organized crime in the country. The paper will use the Slovak case and look for possible directions for the recent development of the concepts of biopower and biopolitics. The analysis will dig into how the power developed under notions of neoliberalism and new authoritarianism in the recent economic system and elaborate on the thesis that a new type of political subjectivity is on the horizon.