Britannica Sources used in this answer

What did Michel Foucault mean when he said that everything is dangerous?

Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.

Michel Foucault, wearing glasses and a striped shirt with a blazer, smiles in a close-up black and white portrait. — Postmodernism French philosopher and historian Michel Foucault, 1979.

When Michel Foucault stated that "everything is dangerous," he was clarifying that his perspective was not one of total nihilism or the belief that everything is inherently "bad." Instead, he meant that because all social practices, institutions, and systems of power-knowledge carry the potential for domination and oppression, they must be constantly scrutinized and questioned.1

By asserting that everything is dangerous, Foucault aimed to reject political apathy. He argued that if every aspect of our social reality holds the risk of becoming an arbitrary exercise of power, then we always have work to do. This realization leads not to resignation, but to what he described as a "hyper- and pessimistic activism"—a continuous, critical engagement with the structures that shape our lives.1

For Foucault, this approach was essential because he believed that modern institutions often mask their power through the guise of objective, scientific, or "rational" expertise. Consequently, his philosophy encourages individuals to remain vigilant and to engage in the "reflective practice of freedom" by challenging the modes of subjectivation and domination under which they live.21