The impact of extended COVID-19 lockdowns on Scottish residents’ mental health

This article will explore Michel Foucault’s ideas with respect to the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), focusing on biopolitics and the influence of the surveillance state. The impact of extended and extensive lockdowns on the mental health of Scottish residents is scrutinized from a Foucauldian perspective. A key limitation of using Foucault’s framework for analysing the pandemic must be recognized. While Foucault’s perspective focuses on control mechanisms, it might lead to viewing all public health measures with suspicion. For example, the UK’s vaccination campaign was said to have prevented approximately 100,000 deaths, demonstrating that biopower can be beneficial, not solely oppressive. The framework is most useful not as a comprehensive critique but to challenge uncomfortable assumptions about who wields power, whose lives are valued, and how consent is created. In this way, it remains a vital perspective for understanding not only COVID-19, but also the broader dynamics between governance, bodies, and society.