SOC205H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 22: Governmentality, Jeremy Bentham, Panopticon
Document Summary
The prison didn"t discover delinquents, it created them. He didn"t locate power in one site. Some groups have more power to get their message of truth across. Explains how we understand punishment differently over time. Discipline works through different forms of power than torture. (at the time the dominant power was sovereignty) Distinguish between three different forms of power: sovereignty: ruler who has power and pronounces the law. In this structure coercive power is dominant (torture): discipline: embodied in the rise of the modern prison. Current system isn"t so much coercive, they wanted rehabilitation: governmentality: operates around risk principles. In his book, gives description of a gruesome torture. Torture was meant to be carried out in public (executions were public events). This is to set a precedence and to deter future behavior, create fear of the authority. It"s about maintaining the power of the sovereign. Torture of the body was thought of as acceptable at the time.
