The Panopticon

Social theorist Michel Foucault was fascinated by the idea of the panopticon, an architectural structure for a prison wherein the cells are pin-wheeled around a central watchtower thereby creating the perfect surveillance machine. The watchtower itself is covered by one-way glass, and any given cell at any given time may be under inspection by a prison guard; conversely, at any given time, most cells are under no surveillance at all. The panopticon represents the ultimate utilitarian design. Prisoners internalize the possibility of external regulation and so begin to regulate themselves; the possible prison guard without becomes the eternal prison guard within.

The crux of Foucault's description is this:

Hence the major effect of the Panopticon: to induce in the inmate a state of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power. So to arrange things that the surveillance is permanent in its effects, even if it is discontinuous in its action; that the perfection of power should tend to render its actual exercise unnecessary; that this architectural apparatus should be a machine for creating and sustaining a power relation independent of the person who exercises it; in short, that the inmates should be caught up in a power situation of which they are themselves the bearers.

This, of course, predated the invention of even more efficient tools of power such as video surveillance and high-powered online search engines, but the implications are even more relevant in the wake of so pervasive a technology. For isn't that the ultimate outcome of new technologies that allow infinite, public access to all information — that we become caught up in a power situation of which we are ourselves the bearers? This is truly a boon for our elected hall monitors. We don't need to be regulated if we regulate ourselves, which is precisely what we begin to do if we may at any moment be the subject of intense external scrutiny. Admit it. You've googled yourself.

To better regulate myself, I have installed Google gadgets on my desktop, allowing me to surveil myself more thoroughly than ever before. Plus, it has a neat Magic 8-Ball feature.

I am such a tool. (Of power.)