Fitness as Political Practice in Modern History

Abstract This article examines the evolution of a political order built on its citizens’ ambitious self-government and achievement and how the fit body became key to this order. In the first part, the article traces the origins of our current understanding of fitness back to the writings of John Locke and the invention of human agency and an ambitious pursuit of achievement as political paradigms. The second part moves on to the nineteenth century and shows how the body moved to the center of ambitious attention and how working on one’s body indicated a desire and responsibility for achievement. In the United States in particular, improving one’s physical ability meant living up to the demands of good citizenship. The article argues that fitness is a liberal political practice, and at the same time it means voluntary submission to the normative ideal of achievement and successful subjecthood.