ABSTRACT
A book linking Foucault and Buddhism might at first glance seem unlikely to throw light on a religion founded in ancient India, and it might seem unlikely that a Foucauldian reading of Buddhism would be productive. This work suggests Foucault’s ideas provide one method of reflecting on the different ways that the Buddhist Vinaya may be interpreted and a means of considering how Western ideas of law have prejudiced our understanding of the Vinaya as a form of ‘law’ or ‘code’. At the same time, Foucault’s work demonstrates how various forms of mental cultivation (ethics, confession, transgressions) may contribute to personal development, or what I will later refer to as the ‘production’, of a new individual or ‘subject’.
