It feels like this kind of language use only came into vogue during the last few decades, but is now extremely common in humanities academia as well as pseudointellectual "cultural" publications such as the New Yorker and this one.

- "an active process of aid" etc. Trying to describe simple or obvious things using vague language with a sort of "conceptual" flavor or affectation. It reminds me a little bit of the "translation" of Ecclesiastes in Orwell's Politics and the English Language but it also has its own distinct flavor. The French are probably to blame, somehow.

edit: Blah blah blah Foucault a few paragraphs in. You can't make this shit up