Biopolitical Nomos and “bare life” in Arundhati Roy’s novels

Abstract

Biopolitics—the maneuvers and stratagems employed to regulate, manage and govern people—is one of the most contested theoretical paradigms, which deals with the relation between state politics and human lives. While Foucault links the biopolitical nomos with the oppressive practices which render the human body docile, Giorgio Agamben sheds light on the new biopolitical nomos, which applying the most draconian means, subdue people within the law. According to Agamben, the arbitrary use of such sovereign power not only robs of the constitutional rights of the individuals but also denies their rights to live. Agamben observes that under the new biopolitical nomos each individual is exposed to the threat of being treated as a Homo Sacer, whose life can be taken with impunity. Focusing on Foucault’s concept of biopolitics and applying Agamben’s concepts like “state of exception” and Homo Sacer, the present paper investigates into Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things and The Ministry of Utmost Happiness to argue that in present-day India; the enactment of juridico-discursive power (communal riots, lynching, and violence to the lower caste) is not only denying the human rights of the minority groups but also exposing them to a “bare life.”