Panopticism

Panoptism ( from the Greek panoptes = " all seer ") is a term introduced by the French philosopher Michel Foucault term used to describe the increasing monitoring and control mechanisms and resulting social conformity of the individual in the development of Western society since the 18th century.

The term panoptism is based on the architectural design of a perfect prison, the " panopticon ," by Jeremy Bentham.

Panoptism as power phenomenon

According to Foucault in the 18th century with the " awakening of interest in the human body " due to the relations of production changing towards capitalism a more effective mechanism for monitoring and disciplining of society through than before on usual repressive power techniques.

This " microphysics of power " is supported by a constraint form, which increasingly controls the population by an over all spheres of society exciting network of disciplinary institutions ( esp. school, military, hospital) and regulates the panoptism. The principle of panoptism is the knowledge of the constant possibility of observation of a Watched by his supervisor: " He who is subjected to the visibility and knows this, accepts the coercive means of power and plays them against himself; he internalized the power relation in which he simultaneously plays both roles; he becomes the principle of his own subjection. "

Regardless of actually taking place monitoring the individual is under observation of potential disciplined himself by his behavior adapts to the normative expectations placed on it. Over a longer period, this mechanism leads to an internalization of the expected standards, and thus a costly from the perspective of standard preparers external constraint at a cost effective self-control ( self-discipline ).

Bentham's Panopticon

As a rotunda designed with the cells along the outer wall, with windows but only inside the round yard, a watchtower in the middle, Bentham's Panopticon should allow perfect monitoring of prisoners with minimal staff effort.

A logical further development of this principle leads to further control rooms in concentric circles, so that the monitors themselves are again monitored, and run as the task assigned to them as possible disciplined. At the end of these reflections is a network of monitored supervisors, their subjective freedom is always already partially specified or limited by the internalized power by means of the panoptism.

Panoptism as an analysis tool

The philosophical and theoretical considerations panoptism can be used to analyze today's power structures. Important here are the questions:

  • Who or what are those bodies whose standards are internalized by means of the panoptic principle?
  • By what instruments, technical developments and their (potential) practical application disciplining constraints exercised today? Tags in this context are, for example, video surveillance, telephone monitoring, dragnet.
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