Panopticism

Conceptual Overview

The religious auspices of panopticism are well established. For instance, the English church of St. Edmund and St. Mary, Ingatestone, houses a painting by an anonymous artist. It depicts Christ placed at the center of a circle. Arrayed around him in sectors of the circle are individual tableaux, each illustrating one of the Seven Deadly Sins. Allegorical works like this were common in medieval European churches and were meant to convey key aspects of Christian morality to a largely illiterate populace. In this case, the message is unambiguous: wherever you commit sin, Christ will see you. Consequently, bad deeds will not go unpunished and you should adjust your conduct accordingly. The most famous example of this pictorial allegory was painted by Hieronymus Bosch around 1485 and it currently hangs in the Prado Museum, Madrid. What is particularly striking about Bosch's version of this morality tale is that the figure of Christ is surrounded by what appears to be the iris of an eye, suggesting a disembodied and all-seeing gaze extending into every aspect of our lives, regardless of where we are. Its presence in medieval Europe suggests that people were conscious of the disciplinary possibilities of constant surveillance (albeit in a divine form) well in advance of modern conceptions of deviance and deterrence.

The earliest explicitly modern, rather than medieval, discussion of panopticism and social control is generally attributed to the British philosopher Jeremy Bentham. Bentham lived during a period when the British prison population was rapidly increasing (a combination of general population growth and a steady reduction in the number of capital offenses). First and foremost, Bentham saw this as a business opportunity where he could put his utilitarian beliefs to work for financial gain; he developed his design for a “Panopticon or Inspection House” with the aim of selling it to governments then embarking on ambitious prison building programs. His intention was to create an architectonic machine that would place inmates under constant surveillance and, when looked at today, the floor plan for the panopticon bears an uncanny resemblance to Bosch's painting. Thus, there was to be a central inspection tower with individual cells placed around it in a circle, and Bentham worked on making this basic design a practical reality for nearly 20 years. Given that it was never adopted by any government (an abortive attempt was made to build a faithful version of the panopticon in Russia) then, on its own terms, Bentham's design ought to be considered a failure. Echoes of the panopticon can be seen, however, in early modern prisons like Strangeways [Page 1216]and Pentonville in Britain and, in the United States, the First Western Penitentiary, Pittsburgh, and the Fort Leavenworth Disciplinary Barracks, Kansas.

Considering the rather indirect impact that Bentham's design had on prison building, we might reasonably expect that it would be nothing more than a footnote in criminology and the histories of architecture and philosophy. Two things, however, ensured that the panopticon would remain relevant, especially for students of organizations. First, Bentham thought that he had devised a social system where surveillance ensured perfect order; a principle that still inspires designers of organizations. Second, although Bentham was conscious of the direct deterrent effect of surveillance, his ultimate expectation was for the panopticon to have an impact on the basic morality of the inmates to such an extent that it would ultimately bring about their reformation and rehabilitation (hence the name, penitentiary). This notion that constant surveillance can bring about compliance and, ultimately, instill a docile disposition in people is also central to our current understanding of panopticism in organization studies.

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