Latour, Foucault, and Post-Truth: The Role and Function of Critique in the Era of the Truth Crisis

This paper scrutinizes Bruno Latour's critique of contemporary critical theory. According to Latour, poststructuralist conceptions of critical inquiry are increasingly behind the times: in our "post-factual" era, attempts to expose facts as results of power-laden processes of social construction play in the hands of obscurantist anti-scientific positions. Arguing at the same time against reductionist notions of objectivity, Latour proposes a new form of critical realism. While Latour plausibly advocates the necessity of widening our epistemological paradigm, we aim to show that his critique of poststructuralism is unjust and hyperbolic. Moreover, his own conception misses out on explicating the relationship between epistemology, power, and subjectivity. Therefore, we argue that a Foucauldian form of critique, as it allows to account for this relationship, is all but outdated. Rather, it remains a necessary critical device in the context of the present truth-crisis.