Panopticism

Panopticism is a social theory originally developed by French philosopher Michel Foucault in his book, "Discipline and Punish".

ummary

Foucault begins his discussion of Panopticism with a description of the measures taken in plague affected towns in the seventeenth century: the towns were closed down and sealed to prevent anyone from coming or going. Strict divisions of space are made and guards are appointed to patrol the designated areas. Only the guards are permitted to walk the streets of the town: everyone else must remain inside their homes at all times. Provisions are hoisted into houses by pulleys, for minimal contact between the supplier and the resident. Inspections of the homes and their occupants are frequent and thorough. Everything observed by the inspector is noted and recorded. This segmented discipline was in response to the confusion and disorder brought on by the plague. While the leper called for separated societies, the plague called for disciplined ones. Foucault identifies the plague-stricken town as an arena where power and discipline can be exercised flawlessly. He then moves on to discuss Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon, a functioning representation of Panopticism. Although this style of architecture could be used for various institutions, Bentham uses a prison as an example: it is a building with a tower in the center, from which all the surrounding cells are visible. The inside of the tower, though, cannot be seen. It individualizes and leaves them constantly visible; never knowing when they are being observed. The occupant is always “the object of information, never a subject in communication.”cite web |title = Part Three: Discipline 3. Panopticism |publisher= Cartome |url= http://www.cartome.org/foucault.htm |accessdate= 2008-01-29] This type of design can be used for any population that needs to be kept under observation, such as: prisoners, schoolchildren, medical patients or workers.

“If the inmates are convicts, there is no danger of a plot, an attempt at collective escape, the planning of new crimes for the future, bad reciprocal influences; if they are patients, there is no danger of contagion; if they are madmen there is no risk of their committing violence upon one another; if they are schoolchildren, there is no copying, no noise, no chatter, no waste of time; if they are workers, there are no disorders, no theft, no coalitions, none of those distractions that slow down the rate of work, make it less perfect or cause accidents.”

By individualizing the subjects and putting them in a state of constant visibility, the efficiency of the institution is maximized. Furthermore, it guarantees the function of power, even when there is no one actually asserting it. It is in this respect that the Panopticon functions automatically. Foucault goes on to explain that this design is also applicable for a laboratory. Its mechanisms of individualization and observation give it the capacity to run many experiments simultaneously. These qualities also give an authoritative figure the “ability to penetrate men’s behavior” with extreme ease. This is all made possible through ingenious architectural design.

Although Bentham presents the Panopticon as a specified institution, Foucault insists that we consider it to be a model of functioning. It is a “mechanism of power,” a “figure of political technology that may and must be detached from any specific use.” Fewer people have to exercise power, while more are affected by its assertion. Anywhere the principals of Panopticism are applied, the flawless exercise of power is possible.

When social centers of observations started becoming more and more demanding and numerous, the disciplinary procedures changed with it. Religions and governments have always aimed to achieve full disciplinary power. They have always wished to have full control of the population.

He moves onto the third point titled “The state-control of the mechanisms of discipline”. During the eighteenth century in England, it was private religious groups that directed social discipline.Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York: Random House, Inc.. 1975. pp.213] In France on the other hand, social discipline was enforced by the police. The police were a new form of control and allowed for royalty to directly control what went on in the streets. It was said by Des Essarts that, “It is he who operates all the wheels that together produce order and harmony” (Des Essarts, 344 and 528) Now although this police power was ‘in the hand of the king’, it did not function in one way Foucault (1975) pp.214] . It was a double sided system. It had to bend the social rules while following the king’s orders. They also took suggestions and demands from those below. The police stood as a tool for political supervision to stand against movements and revolts: just another form of human oppression.

Disciplining people is not an easy task. It involves “instruments, techniques, procedures, levels of application, and, of course, targets”.Foucault (1975) pp. 215] It is the job of the police to make sure that “discipline reigns over society as a whole”.Foucault (1975) PP.216 ]

Social discipline stretches from enclosed disciplines, or social quarantine, to the mechanism of Panopticism. Social discipline infiltrates all other forms of control and discipline. We might not always know it but it is there. It is a form of deception, ‘assuring’ people of a distribution of the power.

According to Bentham Julius, human society has moved from community and public life, where society’s “blood flowed” allowing for a single great body, to individuals and the state. The latter form of society works against the previous one. In a society run by the state, everything done is for the sole purpose of the state. Individuals blindly contribute to the creation of infrastructure and control.

There is a fascinating aspect to how modern panoptic societies are designed. On the outside, they are fabricated to seem free and open, but the outside is completely controlled by the interior surveillanceFoucault (1975) pp.217] The circuits of communication are the main tools used to keep this image comfortably working. It is not that the will of the individual is amputated, repressed, or altered; instead it is molded so that the individual willingly accepts the modes of control. We are part of the “panoptic machine, invested by its effects of power, which we bring to ourselves since we are part of its mechanism”.

Disciplinary society has been formed by economy, juridico-politics, and finally science.Foucault (1975) pp. 218] There is also a triple objective to discipline: firstly, “to obtain the exercise of power at the lowest possible cost”; secondly, “to bring the effects of this social power to their maximum intensity to extend them as far as possible, without failure”; and thirdly, “to like this ‘economic’ growth of power with the output of the apparatuses (educational, military, industrial or medical) within which is exercised”.

Economy

A major change in discipline came during the eighteenth century. When France and other European countries were overwhelmed by opposition from many sects inside their borders, they came to realize that ‘levying violence’ would no longer hold up.Foucault (1975) pp.219] That this old form of control was going to be unsuccessful. Instead, governments decided to substitute ‘mildness-production-profit’. Instead of forcing the people into paying and succumbing to government, they would convince them that it was more profitable for them if they accepted the government’s terms. These are techniques that allow control over the multiplicity of men and the multiplicity of apparatuses of production.

Discipline controls and fixes; “it arrest or regulates movements; it clears up confusion; it dissipates compact groupings of individuals wandering about the country in unpredictable ways; it establishes calculated distributions”. Its main goal is to know where everyone is, at all times. Discipline wants to know what individuals are thinking and wants to be one step ahead every time. The most important thing, over all the things aforementioned, is that discipline tries to control counter-power.

The economic take-off of the west was made possible by the accumulation of capital.Foucault (1975) pp.220] This was done through the accumulation of men. It would not have been possible to keep control of the accumulation of men if it was not for capital. Capital allowed for men to be sustained and used.Foucault (1975) pp.221] The growth of a capitalist economy allowed for the most diverse political regimes, or institutions, to control all forms of populations.

Juridico-political

The general juridical form supported and guaranteed a system of rights that were egalitarian in principle. The way these rights were protected was through non-egalitarian principles.Foucault (1975) p.222] Although representative governments make it possible for individuals to participate, the main base for this government is submission of forces and bodies. Panopticism creates a creative way of coercion to disciplines. The “Enlightenment”, which discovered the liberties, also created the disciplines. The Enlightenment was the tool needed for Panopticism to pry its hands into the social.

cience

Technology seeped into the lives of all. Slowly it made its way into hospitals, schools, making them, along with other institutions, apparatuses such that “any mechanism of objectification could be used in them as an instrument of subjection”.Foucault (1975) pp.224] Panopticism was not placed in the same category as other technological advancements such as agronomical, industrial, or economic. It is seen as nothing more than an idea. One reason that it received little praise was because the discourses it presented rarely acquired the status of sciences.Foucault (1975) pp.225] There was not much to gain, unlike the other sciences that could be used to make money. The real reason, however, is that “the power that it operates and which it augments is a direct, physical power that men exercise upon one another”.

“What this politico-juridical, administrative and criminal, religious and lay, investigation was to the sciences of nature, disciplinary analysis has been to the sciences of man.”Foucault (1975) pp.226]

Examples of Panopticism in Modern Society

A central idea to Foucault’s Panopticism is the systematic ordering and controlling of human populations through subtle and often unseen forces. This is apparent in many parts of the modernized world. Modern advances in technology and surveillance techniques have made Foucault’s theories all the more pertinent to any scrutiny of the relationship between the state and its population.

England

The use of photographic surveillance began in 1913 with the surreptitious taking of pictures from disguised locations of the suffragette inmates of Holloway Prison. The first use on record of camera surveillance in public space was that of the Metropolitan Police at Trafalgar Square in 1960. They used two temporary cameras to monitor crowds during the arrival of the Thai royal family and on Guy Fawkes Day. Between 1960 and 1996, the proliferation of the closed circuit system resulted in government spending on it accounting for more than three-quarters of the total crime prevention budget and a mass demonstration against camera surveillance in Brighton in May 1997. Over the next few years, face and license plate recognition was installed in key positions in London.cite web |title =A history of video surveillance in England |publisher= Not Bored! |url= http://www.notbored.org/england-history.html |accessdate= 2008-01-29] With the recent 7/7 bombings, the effectiveness of the CCTV system has come under scrutiny, with emerging reports showing little or no deterrence of overall crime in London.cite web |title = Tens of thousands of CCTV cameras, yet 80% of crime unsolved |publisher = The Evening Standard |url= http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23412867-details/Tens+of+thousands+of+CCTV+cameras,+yet+80%25+of+crime+unsolved/article.do |accessdate = 2008-01-29 ]

United States

New York City has recently stated ambitions to create its very own “Ring of steel”, very much similar to that surrounding London. It would surround 1.7 square miles of Lower Manhattan and cost $90 million. As of August, the city had raised about $25 million.cite web |title= Ring of Steel' coming to New York |publisher= Cable News Network|url= http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/08/01/nyc.surveillance/index.html |accessdate= 2008-01-29] As in the case of the already installed camera security system in London, its ostensible effectiveness is continually under question.

In addition, the [http://www.ezpass.com/ EZ PASS] system used in the New York metropolitan area is very much panoptic at heart. It was initially designed to alleviate traffic on highways and exit ramps, but is by all means a particularly effective means of surveillance. It logs each and every toll an automobile passes through, thus there are records of the daily driving habits and destinations of every EZ PASS customer stored in a file. A photograph of the license plate is taken and stored, and traffic violation citations are mailed to a customer’s home address should he or she not pay their toll. These files can be reviewed by authorized law enforcement agents in police investigations with or without the customer’s consent. The result of this is that drivers are much more aware of their driving habits around toll plazas and become compliant to the driving rules and regulations in fear of being written up electronically.cite web |title = Panoptic Structure: EZ Pass|publisher= Pinion.nintelligent.net |url= http://pinion.nintelligent.net/Panoptic%20Structure.doc |accessdate= 2008-01-29]

Notes

References

*cite book |last= Foucault |first= Foucault |title= Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison |publisher= Vintage Books |date= 1995 |location= New York |url= http://foucault.info/documents/disciplineAndPunish/foucault.disciplineAndPunish.panOpticism.html |accessdate= 2008-06-15