I've been involved in a project (not off the ground) which involves human
rights monitoring in Haiti. Part of the project involves extensive use of
video cameras. The them or question of monitoring comes to light here. What
of human rights monitoring? And there is a strange play as concerns the
panoptical foirmation in prisons: what is focused on (and for the time being
this is a criticism I have of Foucault) is this particular play of effects and
practices, yet they do need to be understood in the context of imprisonment.
They are, of course, the but is the prison as such thematized? Not in
Foucualt, I mean, when we say or deply "panopticon". My guess is that it is
possible to fixate on the panopticon as such too much. We do, for example,
look at one another. On the other hand, I'm very concernined about possible
abuses of video cameras, bad kinds of paranoia, etc. And I am fully
capable, I think, or sketching out how the most severe levels of violence
could be accpokmplished using panoptical arrangements. I'd appreciate
feedback. Thanks.IVAALM@xxxxxxxxxx writes:
>
>Americans might be interested to know that similar cameras were set
>up (together with the closing off of some streets) in Chelsea
>Massachusetts, as part of a federally-funded, locally-resisted,
>`anti-crime' programme. Maybe it didn't make CNN because most of the
>residents of Chelsea are working-poor immigrant and first-generation
>families?
> I think it's interesting that `this aspect of disciplinary society'
>appeared in the US in prisons first of all -- that is, with a population
>least able to resist and least likely to gain popular support.
>Linda McPHee
>ISS, The Hague
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Tom Blancato Not satisfied with the progress.
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