The purpose of architecture is to shelter and enhance man's life on earth and to fulfill his belief in the nobility of his existence.

November 12, 2006 10:01 AM

Panopticon: a type of prison, designed by a philosopher, that through a cunning scheme of probability, architecture and observation provides the 'sentiment of an invisible omniscience'.
posted by 31d1 (51 comments total)

The Internets and The Google are the ultimate manifestation of this notion, but more clever, since they convey the impression that the prisoner is the observer.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 10:10 AM on November 12, 2006 [5 favorites has favorites]

Oooh, this panopticon, it watches?
posted by shownomercy at 10:16 AM on November 12, 2006

I got an internets the other day, but I couldn't tell where it came from.
posted by judge.mentok.the.mindtaker at 10:17 AM on November 12, 2006

I feel I should have noted that the google maps link is of Stateville prison in Joliet, the sole remaining panopticon prison in the US, and there is a picture of it in the last link.

This whole thing just freaks me out really bad. Like that thing from Orwell 'a boot stamping on a human face, forever' except the picture I have is a naked human crouched in a corner weeping, forever.
posted by 31d1 at 10:18 AM on November 12, 2006

What bollocks is this? (From the last link.)

Over 4 million cameras are installed in that tiny, island country, each one linked to a immense network known popularly as CCTV (closed-circuit television). If a shop wants to install a camera where there isn't one already, they must subscribe to CCTV and a camera is then added to the vast array that are already scanning the citizenry.

CCTV is the name of the technology, not some nefarious network. While various police forces might operate their own systems, if a shopkeeper wants to install a camera, he just does it, linking it up either to his own control room, or more likely, to an unwatched video recorder.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:25 AM on November 12, 2006

This whole thing just freaks me out really bad.

So you think that prisons should have *no* surveillance over the inmates?

Good luck with that. And if I ever end up in jail, God forbid *I* never end up in such a place.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:27 AM on November 12, 2006

31d1, according to the Wiki, Pelican Bay in California is a Panopticon prison. It is also a supermax prison where they send the baddest of the bad. If they end up curled up in their cells weeping, I'm not going to feel too bad for them.

But then, our prison system is sorely overtaxed by recreational drug users, which I think is a terrible waste of resources and it converts a fair percentage of them into real criminals.
posted by fenriq at 10:28 AM on November 12, 2006

The Michel Foucault essay is required reading on this topic.
posted by exit at 10:29 AM on November 12, 2006

I'm not arguing against surveillance - it's just this particular method so cunningly and completely overwhelms some very basic things that I'd regard essential to human sanity. No matter how bad a person is, or how hard I'd want to punish them, the pure panopticon design is not something I could wish on anyone.

Especially if we still propose rehabilitation of inmates as one of the purposes of imprisonment (do we?).
posted by 31d1 at 10:38 AM on November 12, 2006

CCTV is the name of the technology, not some nefarious network.

True enough, but the UK Government actually does call the entire program CCTV. But you're quite right -- most of the cameras are in fact for post-crime analysis. Police do use street cameras linked to central offices, though, and this year they began using them to deter crime by having officers tell people to behave when they see suspicious activity. That's very much on point.
posted by dhartung at 10:43 AM on November 12, 2006

Paging err... panoptican. Which I guess is some sort of all-seeing foodstuff-preservation device.
posted by synaesthetichaze at 10:44 AM on November 12, 2006

Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia is based on the panopticon idea. I'm not sure it's a true panopticon, but it's really cool to visit.
posted by Medieval Maven at 10:50 AM on November 12, 2006

Consider today's BBC report concerning CCTV surveillance systems in an area of London which is planned to be expanded to include, just on its first implementation, tens of thousands of other citizens in other areas.

The government funded program, called ASBO TV, invites residents to pay £3.50 and have access to a TV channel that enables them to monitor 400 different CCTV surveillance cameras and report on suspicious or anti-social behavior, comparing suspects to an on-screen rogues gallery.

It is truly the surveillance cameras that are the insidious panopticon in our lives. Over 4.2 million cameras in the UK, and spreading internationally.
posted by Rumple at 10:52 AM on November 12, 2006

In other words, the warden is now a distributed for-pay intelligence network.
posted by Rumple at 10:53 AM on November 12, 2006

A good source of documents on the CCTV surveillance issue.
posted by Rumple at 10:55 AM on November 12, 2006

You don't have to go to prison. Society as a whole is becoming panoptic.

Ditto on Foucault, and P.K. Dick's A Scanner Darkly deals with this, too.
posted by ludwig_van at 10:55 AM on November 12, 2006

Over 4 million cameras are installed in that tiny, island country

A very melodramatic article. FFS, it's not the village from The Prisoner.
posted by greycap at 11:01 AM on November 12, 2006

Really, you should read the entire text of Discipline and Punish. It's a brilliant work, and Foucault is very lucid and readable.

Also, there's a book by Angela Carter, Nights at the Circus, in which part of the story takes place in a panopticon prison. I haven't read it in years and I don't seem to have my copy of the book anymore, but from what I remember that section is about an all female prison, and the inmates find creative ways to subvert the panoptic gaze and, I think, eventually escape the prison. It's an interesting political statement.
posted by papakwanz at 11:02 AM on November 12, 2006 [1 favorite has favorites]

Stateville prison in Joliet, the sole remaining panopticon prison in the US

Except for, you know, all of them, by analogy. Per exit's link: the Benthamite observation tower in the middle of a round room is merely "the architectural figure of this composition"; the point is that it enforces discipline through imposing the constant possibility of observation, while stripping away the ability to determine if one is actually being observed at any given time.

The small security camera in the corner of a cell serves the same purpose. As do the ones along the ceiling in any retail establishment, etc.
posted by rkent at 11:04 AM on November 12, 2006

FFS, it's not the village from The Prisoner.

Translation: La La La La La La La La La La La
posted by Rumple at 11:04 AM on November 12, 2006

...and also an album from ISIS...
posted by Luciferous at 11:25 AM on November 12, 2006

Yeah, one more vote for reading Discipline and Punish. As it points out, the insidious thing is not the fact of constant or intermittent surveillance, but rather a system (the panoptic mechanism) whereby the inmates (or everyone everywhere always already) surveille themselves... Thats the crux of a disciplinary society. Of course, some would say that disciplinary societies are soooo 20th century, and really we've moved on to control societies.
posted by jrb223 at 11:31 AM on November 12, 2006

A FPP on an elementary subject without a reference to the dominant work on the subject? What's next?

Evolution: a theory of popluation dynamics whereby individual traits are changed. All without a link to Darwin.
posted by allen.spaulding at 11:34 AM on November 12, 2006

Evolution: a theory of popluation dynamics whereby individual traits are changed. All without a link to Darwin.

He linked to Bentham, didn't he? Foucault was only explicating Bentham's thesis on a wider scale.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 11:56 AM on November 12, 2006

No matter how bad a person is, or how hard I'd want to punish them, the pure panopticon design is not something I could wish on anyone.

And I'd suggest that if you were a handsome young geek, serving time with a muscular bunch of temporary homosexuals with a penchant for male rape, the very last thing that you'd be wanting is blind spots where the panopticon can't see you taking on all comers.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 11:59 AM on November 12, 2006

And they said God was dead.
posted by washburn at 12:16 PM on November 12, 2006

fenriq, I don't have links handy but there was a post here on MeFi a while ago about SuperMax prisons and Pelican Bay in particular - and how a couple of prisoners there are effectively political prisoners or otherwise nonviolent offenders.

The problems with the SuperMax concept are numerous, above and beyond the problems of the panopticon, above and beyond the fact that it's not just "the baddest of the bad".

They're building more and more of them, and using them more liberally. There are many prisoners in SuperMax prisons for nonviolent offenses, drug or otherwise.

As you say, this probably breeds more hardened criminals.

And does it actually protect us? Nope. There's a Mexican Mafia leader in Pelican Bay that had been calling shots - actual executions - through carefully coded letters, smuggled messages and more.

--

The huge, stinking question hanging over the entire prison industry and our judicial system is whether or not we've actually given up on rehabilitation (I believe that we have) or if our penal system at this point is merely a broken system of warehouses for broken lives.

In the grandly cynical face of ethics and morality over the bloody course of human history, this perhaps wouldn't be such a big deal or so appalling - except for the real possibilty that this system seems to breed more criminals than it removes - except for the very real possibility such a system will eventually make criminals out of every one of us, especially the prison-keepers.
posted by loquacious at 12:20 PM on November 12, 2006

the very real possibility such a system will eventually make criminals out of every one of us, especially the prison-keepers.

Stanford Prison Experiment
posted by ludwig_van at 12:24 PM on November 12, 2006

Peter that's very cute that you think the guards would step in to protect you from the social enforcement system they've set up.
posted by Space Coyote at 12:26 PM on November 12, 2006

If they don't have the chance to do so, the guards can't step in. Of course, just because they can doesn't mean that they will.
posted by Maias at 1:04 PM on November 12, 2006

im in ur prison watching ur ass
posted by matteo at 1:10 PM on November 12, 2006 [1 favorite has favorites]

With a nod towards loquacious's comments in re Pelican Bay, I'd also recommend the book Forced Passages which looks at the subject formation within a category of individuals he terms "Imprisoned Radical Intellectuals," and also looks at the tragedy of the contemporary prison-industrial complex.
posted by jrb223 at 1:10 PM on November 12, 2006

It's notable that the opening credits of Monkey Dust feature CCTVs and hooded kids quite prominently. The CCTV silhouette there seems to riff off the one featured prominently in the Blake's 7 (1978!) opening credits. Respect is due to Terry Nation, as always, even if he did borrow liberally from THX 1138 and Jim Henson's The Cube.
posted by meehawl at 1:39 PM on November 12, 2006

I could have sworn that the Radial OmniView prison design was on here not too long ago..
posted by unmake at 1:41 PM on November 12, 2006

Oh shit, a Foucault discussion that I missed!? Wait, wait, start over!

Are you a panoptican or are you a panoptican't?!
posted by spiderwire at 1:42 PM on November 12, 2006 [1 favorite has favorites]

Welcome to the panopticon, Dagwood!
posted by kirkaracha at 1:49 PM on November 12, 2006

I don't dispute that there are people held in SuperMax prisons who really shouldn't be there. In fact, I'd say there's a rather large percentage of the prison population across the country that probably shouldn't be held behind bars for their "crimes" but that's really not my call. I just try to stay out of trouble because I am a handsome white boy with a cute butt.

And matteo, that got me laughing.
posted by fenriq at 3:23 PM on November 12, 2006

Peter that's very cute that you think the guards would step in to protect you from the social enforcement system they've set up.

Hey, if they want me to keep snitching, they'd better be in there like a flash.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 3:43 PM on November 12, 2006

And I'd suggest that if you were a handsome young geek, serving time with a muscular bunch of temporary homosexuals with a penchant for male rape, the very last thing that you'd be wanting is blind spots where the panopticon can't see you taking on all comers.

Maybe the warden likes to watch.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 5:41 PM on November 12, 2006

exit, man, brings me back. At one point back in college that Foucault essay was required reading in 3 of my four classes.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 5:45 PM on November 12, 2006 [1 favorite has favorites]

the very last thing that you'd be wanting is blind spots where the panopticon can't see you taking on all comers

the very last thing that you'd be wanting is blind spots where the panopticon can't see you taking on all comers

That was my first thought. The nightmare isn't really complete without complicit guards. And we don't really think they don't know about what goes on, do we?

I've tried to find this out from a couple of prison guards I've met (ahem, on the outside), and still haven't really gotten a good answer as to knowledge of prison rape -- how much they know about, how much they think is going on but escapes their attention.

Any CO MeFites?
posted by dreamsign at 7:58 PM on November 12, 2006

That was my first thought. The nightmare isn't really complete without complicit guards. And we don't really think they don't know about what goes on, do we?

Ted Conover's book, Newjack, is very good on the extent to which the guards are complicit in such stuff. The reality, of course, is uneven. Some guards don't give a shit. Others will overlook stuff if they think you're an arse who could benefit from a good beating. And yet another group will step forward and do the right thing, regardless.

Just like everywhere else in the world, really.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 8:51 PM on November 12, 2006

Stop Prison Rape has some really grippingly awful information on Prison Culture and its use of rape. From looking through, it is extremely clear that guards know exactly what is going on and condone it, since it helps their purposes to have a well organized hierarchy of prisoners (they police their own) and rape is an integral part of establishing that hierarchy. Awful, grim reading.
posted by Rumple at 9:53 PM on November 12, 2006

it is interesting that many schools are built on a penopticon type layout.

Is that in line with Bentham's plan for "any establishment, in which persons of any description are to be kept under inspection[?]"
posted by pwedza at 10:26 PM on November 12, 2006

"Hey you there. Yeah, you on the Blue"

Check out this article about privatized surveillance in the poorer areas of our nations capital.

Looks like good conditioning for our nation's future prisoners...
posted by pwedza at 10:37 PM on November 12, 2006

Eh, well that was an interesting double quote. Sorry bout that.

Yeah, always wondered what it would take to set yourself apart from all of that if you were sent up. And the truth is probably: nothing. Nothing you could do.
posted by dreamsign at 2:41 AM on November 13, 2006

pwedza: One of the major points in Foucault's book is that just about any public structure that requires a large # of bodies to be supervised is panopticon-esque. Schools, factories, hospitals--they are all like prisons, and prisons are like them.
posted by papakwanz at 8:14 AM on November 13, 2006

hey-hey, don your tin hat and check out this story [linked pdf file, looks like the complete novella], a mystical-spy-horror look at how the CCTV system in the UK could be abused...

if you're interested in how the characters got to this point, you should read "The Atrocity Archives" first...but The Concrete Jungle is more appropriate to the topic at hand.

okay, that's two Charles Stross links for me in one day. I quit.
posted by I, Credulous at 1:49 PM on November 13, 2006

the best part of discipline and punish is the regicide description that opens the book. here's just a small part:

When the four limbs had been pulled away, the confessors came to speak to him; but his executioner told them that he was dead, though the truth was that I saw the man move, his lower jaw moving from side to side as if he were talking. One of the executioners even said shortly afterwards that when they had lifted the trunk to throw it on the stake, he was still alive. The four limbs were untied from the ropes and thrown on the stake set up in the enclosure in line with the scaffold, then the trunk and the rest were covered with logs and faggots, and fire was put to the straw mixed with this wood.

...and hence the phrase, "get medieval on your ass."
posted by spiderwire at 3:51 PM on November 13, 2006

Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships (CDRPs) in The Modern Panopticon; or, The Snitch's Charter:

VERY soon now, crime and disorder will be mapped out on a house-to-house level and displayed on the internet. The maps will be searchable by anyone, including insurance companies, and will also incorporate aerial photography. Backstage, vast amounts of highly sensitive data - including your medical notes - will be sloshed around on local government and emergency services intranet - and across the internet too. Members of the public will be encouraged to submit complaints of anti-social behaviour via email. The resulting crime maps will be used to provide information for, among other things, decisions about architecture in afflicted areas.

The Net, indeed.
posted by cenoxo at 3:54 PM on November 13, 2006

One of the puzzles in the excellent interactive fiction game Slouching Towards Bedlam involves a panopticon prison.
posted by Iridic at 6:10 PM on November 13, 2006