The Panopticon, Past And Present
Jeremy Bentham is noted as a 18th Century social reformer, who supported equal rights for women and the abolition of slavery and capital punishment. But, as if to prove how wacky even the best of us can be, he had an obsession with seeing his invention, the panopticon, come to life.
The panopticon was a type of jail in which the cells were arranged so that they could be seen by guards in a central tower. The guards at all times could observe the prisoners, but the prisoners — due to the construction of the tower — could not see the guards. Thus it was unnecessary that the jailer observe every prisoner at every instant. Prisoners, not able to tell whether they were observed at any given moment, were forever concerned that they MIGHT be under observation, and could never safely assume that they weren’t. They therefore began to take on the work of the jailers, self-monitoring and behaving as if someone was watching them, whatever the truth might be. They would in fact become their own jailers.
Why a progressive-thinking reformer who championed individual rights might think this is a good idea is puzzling, but let it serve as warning that even those who try to do what is best for others and build a better society might be misguided. Utopias that are built on enthusiastic idealism without a proper amount of practicality tend to lose the “u” and acquire a “dys”.
20th Century French philosopher Michel Foucault — a nutter in his own right — was at least able to point out the dangers of the panopticon. First off — and as a student of communication, I relate to this — the panopticon disrupts the relationship between the observer and the observed. The very nature of human connectivity is severed. Most often we see the power relationship is unbalanced when one side is allowed to communicate while the other is unable to respond. Take, for example, the mass media, where one side is able to promote its narrative while those without power have no voice. But the opposite also demonstrates an unbalanced power structure. One side is afforded its privacy and anonymity while the other is constantly or potentially constantly exposed.
The 21st Century has its own — digital — version of the panopticon. Scarcely any one of us expects he can walk out his front door without being monitored. Or at least potentially monitored. I took a rare walk through Walmart today and saw myself in an overhead screen as I made my way down the aisle. At least I knew in this circumstance that I was being watched, but it was a reminder too that I can never be certain that I am NOT being watched. I must always be aware of others, and when I do this I am no longer internally motivated but externally motivated. I could be the most moral and compassionate person in the world, but when I feel I am being watched I am no longer led by my superior ethics but instead by an inclination towards obedience.
If we are potentially being monitored by camera at any moment outside our own homes, it is even worse within. Every comment we make on social media, every site we visit, every Netflix documentary or YouTube video we watch provides potentially revealing information to we know not exactly who. We are far more observed than any prisoner in any prison in any past age.
The picture I have included is a section of a Japanese version of a panopticon. It was built in Korea to keep an eye on Korean prisoners jailed for their resistance to the Japanese occupation of their country. In the foreground is a surveillance camera. You can see them everywhere in public places in Korea. I’m not sure exactly who installed them or under what circumstances they can be used to intrude upon one’s privacy. That’s not important. What’s important is that the common citizens know that they could potentially be observed by an anonymous someone at any moment. Korea is not so different than the rest our societies, but it is perhaps a little more noticeable to an outsider such as myself.
“A poor comparison,” you might say, “because the people being watched are not criminals and the people watching are not an occupying force.” Perhaps that may be true, but the power structure is the same. The watcher maintains his anonymity, natural human connection is severed, and the one being watched, constantly aware that he might be being watched, begins to monitor himself and do the job of the observer/jailer for him.
The systems we implement will determine the type of power structure we create. The current systems we have established — which most of the governments in the world have established — is one in which the typical citizen subordinates his own moral and behavioral impulses to an external force. A Henry David Thoreau, Martin Luther King Jr., or Mahatma Gandhi is not likely to arise from such a system. Spiritually will be all but erased in such a system, we see that truth evidenced already. It is difficult to concentrate on a higher power or the voice inside when we are never able to escape the awareness of an external observer. True happiness does not flow from such a system.