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Power is based on knowledge and makes use of knowledge; on the other hand,
power reproduces knowledge by shaping it in accordance with its anonymous
intentions. Power (re-) creates its own fields of exercise through
knowledge.
Foucault incorporates this inevitable mutual inherence in his neologism power-knowledge, the most
important part of which is the hyphen that links the two aspects of the
integrated concept together.
It is helpful noting that Foucault has a textual understanding of both power
and knowledge. Both power and knowledge are to be seen as de-centralised,
relativistic, ubiquitous, and unstable (dynamic) systemic phenomena. Thus
Foucault’s concept of power draws on micro-relations without falling into reductionism because it does
not neglect, but emphasizes, the systemic (or structural) aspect of the
phenomenon.
However, he does not actually define knowledge.
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