Discipline And Punish: The Birth of the Prison

“Certainly the ‘crimes’ and ‘offences’ on which judgement is passed are juridical objects defined by the code, but judgement is also passed on the passions, instincts, anomalies, infirmities, maladjustments, effects of environment or heredity.”

This idea foreshadows Foucault’s later arguments about Norms. He asserts that punishment is always applied to those who break the Norms established by a society; it is not necessarily related to morality or even to crime in a traditional sense. This is the heart of The Function of Punishment. It serves to maintain order and conformity within a society. This represents a shift in social sensibilities and connects to Foucault’s earlier work Madness and Civilization. Conformity, like the soul, is a modern invention. Foucault asserts that prior to the late 17th century, outliers lived a rambling and free existence. Conformity brought the need for confinement and concealment.

“But the body is also directly involved in a political field; power relations have an immediate hold upon it; they invest it, mark it, train it, torture it, force it to carry out tasks, to perform ceremonies, to emit signs.”

In the theme The Body Versus the Modern Soul, the body functions as a political figure. It is a mechanism that can be utilized by those who wish to exert power. However, Foucault rejects the Marxist principle of class relations with power. Although he acknowledges that the bourgeoisie utilizes power to control the proletariat, he recognizes a power that is unique to the lower classes. In Foucault’s philosophy, power pervades everything and constitutes humanity. The body serves as an instrument in the strategies of power.

“Torture is a technique; it is not an extreme expression of lawless rage.”

Instead of casting judgment on one form of punishment, Foucault is concerned with the genealogy of punishment. He sees torture as a strategy of power—a way of eliciting a desired outcome. This aligns with the theme The Function of Punishment.

“In the practice of torture, pain, confrontation and truth were bound together: they worked together on the patient’s body. The search for truth through judicial torture was certainly a way of obtaining evidence, the most serious of all—the confession of the guilty person; but it was also the battle, and this victory of one adversary over the other, that ‘produced’ truth according to a ritual.”

In the old system of public spectacle, torture was used to elicit truth. Foucault embraces relativism, which suggests that there is no such thing as a singular and universal truth. This is evidenced in the use of public torture. Often the confessions of tortured individuals were lies, delivered in the hope of ending pain. Truth was subjective. The body became the battleground upon which the drama of truth could be played. In the theme The Body Versus the Modern Soul, the body is revealed to be separate from the individual. It is a political mechanism, and truth is merely one insignificant component of a larger struggle for power.

“A body effaced, reduced to dust and thrown to the winds, a body destroyed piece by piece by the infinite power of the sovereign constituted not only the ideal, but the real limit of punishment.”

As revealed in the theme The Body Versus the Modern Soul, the body of the accused is separate from the humanity of the individual. In the instance of public torture, the body serves as a symbol of the power and autonomy of the sovereign. By rendering the body to dust, governmental leaders establish a complete eradication of revolt.

“In the ceremonies of the public execution, the main character was the people.”

The role of the spectators in public torture and execution was to watch the vicious ramifications of committing a crime against sovereign law. However, Foucault argues that there was a secondary component: The public became powerful in these moments because their riots and cries could influence the decision of the king about the fate of the accused. This power became a problem and led to the shift from public spectacle to concealed punishment.

“It was an effort to adjust the mechanisms of power that frame the everyday lives of individuals; an adaptation and a refinement of the machinery that assumes responsibility for and places under surveillance their everyday behaviour, their identity, their activity, their apparently unimportant gestures.”

The modern prison emphasized surveillance over punishment of the body, representative of the evolution of The Body Versus the Modern Soul. Foucault suggests that this surveillance contributed to the invention of the modern soul; constant observation and documentation individualized prisoners and turned them into specific cases.

“A penal system must be conceived as a mechanism intended to administer illegalities differentially, not to eliminate them all.”

Foucault’s argument here reflects his later argument about the true function of the modern prison system. Throughout the work, he emphasizes that all penal systems are different forms of the same thing: Punitive measures are intended to preserve power for some while limiting the power of others. For example, the bourgeoisie enjoys the illegalities of rights while the proletariat is excluded from and prosecuted for those illegalities.

“‘Humanity’ is a respectable name given to this economy and to its meticulous calculations.”

Foucault denies that humanitarian efforts are at the heart of punitive reform and the shift from torture to concealment. Although many protested public spectacle and torture as too brutal, Foucault suggests that the real shift has more to do with the invention of the modern soul and the need to preserve power. Public spectacle was no longer maintaining power for the bourgeoisie because the public was increasingly gaining influence over the outcome of executions. This aligns with The Function of Punishment as a strategy of power.

“If punishment is to present itself to the mind as soon as one thinks of committing a crime, as immediate a link as possible must be made between the two: a link of resemblance, analogy, proximity.”

One of the purposes of penal systems is the intention to deter others from committing crimes. This aligns with the theme The Function of Punishment. Public spectacle was intended to strike fear in the observers through the brutality of the punishment. Prisons relied upon the fear of the possibility of punishment. The codification and specification of law set out to create instantaneous recognition of punishment in the mind before ever committing a crime.

“For this, everyone must see punishment not only as natural, but in his own interest; everyone must be able to read in it his own advantage.”

Prisons rely upon the masses believing in the importance of institution. The propaganda of the prison is that by taking criminals off the streets there is a benefit for the common good. This idea connects to The Relationship Between Knowledge and Power. By concealing the reality of the prison environment and its function, power can be maintained.

“Each crime will have its law; each criminal his punishment. It will be a visible punishment, a punishment that tells all, that explains, justifies itself, convicts: placards, different-coloured caps bearing inscriptions, posters, symbols, texts read or printed, tirelessly repeat the code.”

The idea represented in this quote is that of a discipline. Foucault suggests that disciplines are strategies of power that are utilized to achieve a specific function. The codification of law is a discipline that is intended to align punishment immediately with a crime; it should act as a deterrent. However, these disciplines serve a secondary purpose. They provide a space within which certain groups of people can function with immunity.

“The classical age discovered the body as object and target of power.”

This idea correlates with The Body Versus the Modern Soul. In the classical age, the body was the vehicle for power—the place where power was directed and manipulated. Foucault suggests that the soul is a contemporary invention, but no less of an opportunity for power to be exerted upon.

“In becoming the target for new mechanisms of power, the body is offered up to new forms of knowledge.”

This passage connects the themes The Body Versus the Modern Soul with The Relationship Between Knowledge and Power. Surveillance, observation, and an application of discipline elicits new information. Despite the shift from punishment of the body to punishment of the soul, the body is still an integral part of the modern penal system. It is the body that is stripped of its liberty; it is the body that is observed. The information documented and stored from this surveillance is utilized to maintain power.

“By means of such surveillance, disciplinary power became an ‘integrated’ system, linked from the inside to the economy and to the aims of the mechanism in which it was practiced.”

Before the Panopticon, there was the hierarchal structure of surveillance. This was utilized in military barracks, schools, and other institutions. This idea correlates with The Relationship Between Knowledge and Power. Surveillance became an important way of gathering knowledge and securing power. Foucault suggests that this same strategy is used outside these institutions; the government utilizes surveillance to preserve its control.

“Disciplinary power, on the other hand, is exercised through its invisibility; at the same time it imposes on those whom it subjects a principle of compulsory visibility.”

Foucault argues that one of the myths of the contemporary prison institution is that it is fair and equitable. The reality of imprisonment is one of inequality. By rendering disciplinary power invisible, the system eliminates the possibility of reform or revolt.

“They are like so many cages, so many small theatres, in which each actor is alone, perfectly individualized and constantly visible.”

The Panopticon is the culmination of all the disciplines discussed in Foucault’s work. It utilizes the same elements of public spectacle and combines them with the disciplines described in various forms of imprisonment. The Panopticon is the perfect representation of The Relationship Between Knowledge and Power, emphasizing the juxtaposition of visibility and secrecy.

“The ‘theory of the prison’ was its constant set of operational instructions rather than its incidental criticism—one of its conditions of functioning.”

Even though prison reform emerged almost simultaneously with prisons themselves, actual reform has never occurred. Foucault argues that this is because the function of the penal system is not to transform prisoners into model citizens. Instead, it is to manage illegalities and preserve powers for some while limiting others. This correlates with the theme The Function of Punishment.

“What, then, is the use of penal labour? Not profit; nor even the formation of a useful skill; but the constitution of a power relation.”

Prisons utilize discipline for the purpose of reform. Work is intended to function as a way for prisoners to save a little money before their release and to learn to conform to societal Norms. Those who view prisons as vehicles for prisoner transformation believe that criminals live inconsistently outside the institution. By engaging in a process of continuous work, they learn how to function normally. Foucault rejects this assertion, claiming that the work has a singular function: It is a strategy of power used to maintain control.

“The transition from the public execution, with its spectacular rituals, its art mingled with the ceremony of pain, to the penalties of prisons buried in architectural masses and guarded by the secrecy of administrations, is not transition to an undifferentiated, abstract, confused penalty; it is the transition from one art of punishing to another, no less skillful one.”

This quotation represents the genealogy and relativism Foucault embraced after studying Nietzsche. Rather than casting judgment on the various penal processes, he argues that each is a version of the same thing: a manifestation of power. While early forms of punishment were enacted upon the body and later forms were enacted on the soul, all represented a strategy of power utilized to preserve the opportunity for illegality for certain groups of people. This idea connects to the theme The Body Versus the Modern Soul.

“Prisons do not diminish the crime rate: they can be extended, multiplied or transformed, the quantity of crime and criminal remains stable or, worse, increases.”

This statement represents one of the criticisms of contemporary prisons. Rather than reforming criminals, prisons have high rates of recidivism and cast a wide net of influence. Family members of prisoners are more likely to also land in jail, and prisoners often become repeat offenders, cycling in and out of the system. Foucault argues that these critiques of prisons are as old as the prisons themselves. The fact that these institutions never change should raise a question about the true purpose of punitive action.

“Penalty would then appear to be a way of handling illegalities, of laying down the limits of tolerance, of giving free rein to some, of putting pressure on others, of excluding a particular section, of making another useful, of neutralizing certain individuals and of profiting from others.”

Foucault points to this concept as the purpose of prisons, advancing the theme The Function of Punishment. He asserts that the aim of the modern prison was never to reform prisoners but to maintain a status of power for some. This reflects his earlier work on the different forms of illegalities and how they function in various social classes. Foucault argued that the bourgeoisie enjoyed the illegalities of rights; they were able to move about as they pleased and impose their oppression as they pleased. Meanwhile, the proletariat enjoyed the illegalities of property. In both instances, these illegalities were required to follow a certain set of rules. The function of the prison is to preserve these illegalities and to maintain the power of the bourgeoisie.

“But the supervision of normality was firmly encased in a medicine or a psychiatry that provided it with a sort of ‘scientificity.’”

Foucault draws a connection between the rise of the modern carceral system and the introduction of scientific psychology. Both recognize the invention of the modern soul. The shift in thinking about crimes as merely actions to functions of the internal processing of the mind gave rise to institutions of limitation.