@article{ref1,
title="Panoptic power and the pathologisation of vision: critical reflections on the Foucauldian thesis",
journal="Surveillance and society",
year="2002",
author="Yar, Majid",
volume="1",
number="3",
pages="254-271",
abstract="This article attempts to evaluate theoretically the applicability of Foucault's Panopticon to the practices of public surveillance utilising CCTV technology. The first part maps out three &quot;strands&quot; in the reception of panopticism in surveillance studies, suggesting that it tends to fall into one of three broad kinds: its wholesale appropriation and application; its wholesale rejection as inadequate with respect to a supposedly &quot;post-disciplinary&quot; society; and its qualified acceptance subject to some empirically-dependent limitations. I then attempt in a preliminary way to supplement these three positions. In particular, I question the logical adequacy of equating visual surveillance with effective subjectification and self-discipline by drawing upon a range of philosophical and sociological perspectives. Philosophically, it is suggested that the Foucauldian thesis may well &quot;pathologise&quot; the relationship between subjectivity and visibility, and thereby overlook other dimensions of our experience of vision. Sociologically, it is suggested that the precise relation between surveillance and self-discipline requires us to attend, in ethnomethodological fashion, to the situated sense-making activities of subjects as the go about everyday practical activities in public settings.<p />",
language="en",
issn="1477-7487",
doi="",
url="http://dx.doi.org/"
}