The European Union has responded to this with a new regulation, known as “ the right to an explanation”. Your online behaviour and actions can always be seen but you never see the observer. On the other end of the line, nothing is being communicated, no information divulged. In this scenario, the computer is Bentham’s panopticon tower, and you are the subject from which information is being extracted. When you’re sitting in front of your computer, browsing the web, scrolling down your newsfeed and watching videos, information is being compiled and sent off to your ISP. This sort of monitoring and data collection is particularly analogous with the panopticon because it’s a one-way information avenue. Even public transport cards can be used to monitor physical movements of citizens. Governments around the world are passing laws so they can collect internet data on people suspected of planning terror attacks. Parents can get software to monitor their children’s mobile phone use. Employers can get programs to covertly track keystrokes of staff working from home to make sure they really are putting in their hours. Zuboff outlined the PC’s role as an “information panopticon” which can monitor the amount of work being completed by an individual. While Foucault argued the “ingenious” panoptic method of surveillance can be used for disciplinary methods, Zuboff suggests it can also be used for marketing.Ĭoncerns over this sort of monitoring date back to the beginning of the rise of personal computers in the late 80s. Philosopher and psychologist Shoshanna Zuboff highlights what she calls “surveillance capitalism”. Today, we are more likely to identify the panopticon effect in new technologies than in prison towers. By discarding this isolation within a blockade, the discipline becomes a self-propagating mental mechanism through visibility. On the other hand, Bentham highlights the panopticon’s power as being a “new mode of obtaining mind over mind”. Similar to a dungeon where each inmate is sequestered, administered discipline can be absolute in matters of life or death. Foucault calls this a “discipline blockade”. In Foucault’s village, constant surveillance – or the idea of constant surveillance – creates regulation in even the smallest details of everyday life. If villagers are caught outside, the punishment is death. In order to stamp out the plague, officials must strictly separate everyone and patrol the streets to ensure villagers don’t leave their homes and become sick. To him, this form of incarceration is a “cruel, ingenious cage”.įoucault also compares this disciplinary observation to a medieval village under quarantine. This assures the automatic functioning of power. He argued the panopticon’s ultimate goal is to induce in the inmates a state of conscious visibility. French philosopher, Michel Foucault, was an outspoken critic of the panopticon.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |