Sociological approaches II: Risk as governmentality Flashcards
What is the panopticon?
It is an idea/a set of practices that derives from Bentham and Foucault. The idea is that since we do not know exactly when we are surveilled we govern ourselves. The more subtle a panoptic regime, the more it produces the desired docile bodies
What is panopticommodity?
A word Lyon uses to describe e.g. Big Brother, where people choose to be surveilled as a way of self-expression. People market themselves, and you individuate only by submitting yourself to mass surveillance 2006
What shift does Bigo argue have happened with surveillance technologies?
They have gone from being exceptional practices to being everyday life routines 2006
What shift does the panopticon show a.t. Foucault?
A shift from a society of discipline to a society of management and monitoring life of populations
What does Bigo mean by ban-opticon?
It is about deconstructing the permanent state of emergency and asking the question of who decides what is the public enemy
What is a governmentality of unease?
It is characterized by practices of exceptionalism, acts of profiling and containing foreigners and a normative imperative of mobility. It increases the exception and banalizes it e.g. indefinite detention. After some time these technologies will seem banal, and no one will question their legitimacy
Was 9/11 exceptionel a.t. Bigo?
No, but the fear from some politicians made it into an undeclared war instead of a criminal act, which gave a new role to intelligence and legitimized some measures –> link to securitization (own)
What makes the delimitation between inside and outside a.t. Bigo?
Not the declaration of exception that frames the boundary between the norm and the exception, but the routines of technologies of surveillance. The function of this border changes over time with the regime (e.g. economic, political)
What is the goal of declaring war against clandestine organizations?
To show the public that the elite worries about the public safety - because the elite knows, that it won’t help
How are the narrative of a technology of surveillance chosen?
By looking at the available solutions, not at the real problem. However the professionals of politics wont admit to this
What is the goal of surveillance technologies?
To control identities as invicible as possible in order to have as few protests as possible
What advise does Bigo end up giving?
We cannot only look at how people are treated e.g. at Guantanamo, since daily racism takes place at the borders. We need to insist on this normalization of emergency as a technique of governemnt by unease, since the call for preventive action creates uncertainty.
What does Ewald consider important to study?
Why insurance institutions take particular forms at certain times, and why they use one technique of risk instead of another 1991
What is the form of insurance technology dependent on a.t. Ewald?
The insurantial imaginary = the ways in which useful and necessary uses can be found for insurance technology
What is a risk to Ewald?
Anything can be a risk, but no risks in reality
What is insurance to Ewald?
A practice of a certain kind of rationality based on probability, where it provides a guideline for the objectification of things - it was not initially a practice of compensation
What happens when events are objectiviced in to risks?
Insurance can invert their meaning, so they become possibilities instead of obstacles
What meaning does risk have in insurance?
It has to be calculable, collective (accidents are suffered by individuals, risks of an accident affects populations) and capital (things are given a monetary value for impairment)
Which techniques of insurance does Ewald talk about?
- Economic and financial 2. Moral: To calculate a risk is to master time, to discipline the future 3. Reparation and indemnification of damages Combining these makes insurance a political technology, since it creates a new grouping of human interests. Contractual justice takes the place of natural order
What is the overall goal of insurance a.t. Ewald?
It liberates men from fear
What is the difference between danger and risk a.t. Haggerty?
Dangers can be avoided, risks are inevitable - even when we do nothing
How does the ideal rational individual act in neo-liberalism?
With a precautionary logic; manages her risk profile in light of a knowledge of the types of risks she faces, often with the assistance of expert advice
How are statistics used a.t. Haggerty?
By policy-makers to draw attention to problems. It does not matter whether they are right, if they just repeat a simple message (epistemic device - politics of numbers)
How does precaution differ from risk?
In terms of the potential loss. Compensation makes no sense in precautionary situations, as the events would create irreparable consequences. Risks however can be financial compensated. Furthermore risk decisions are about lowering the possibility, whereas precautionary decisions is about avoiding the worst eventuality
How are precautionary decisions about crime informed?
By a situational rationality that is shaped by informal knowledges, personal history, anxiety and the cultural meanings of crime prevention
What paradox does Haggerty point to in crime prevention?
It has an anti-social dimension in the sense, that if your neighbor builds a higher fence (and increases his security), then your own security decreases, because your home becomes the easier target.
How can one distinguish between precautionary and insurance logics?
What is knowlegde a.t. Foucault?
A tool of control. It produces lines of inclusion and exclusion; what is normal (those at risk) and what is abnormal (the risks)?
What roles do individuals/citizens play in the governing of risk?
They play an important role in the decentralization approach of the precaution logic, taking over responsibilities from pooled resources. Furthermore individuals increasingly employ methods of risk management e.g. by surveilling themselves voluntarily with home alarms.
