Sorry, but I'm in the 'Surveillance isn't sinister as such" camp.
Surveillance of humans is now too widespread, used for too many purposes -
many of which are laudatory, to simply say that 'surveillance is evil.'
However, that does not mean that we should avoid normative statements and
value judgements. What it means is that we have to be conscious that our
normative statements are directed at evaluating particular surveillance
practices in the context of a program of governance. We pass judgment not on
surveillance tout court but on how it is instanciated at particular times,
directed at particular people, overseen by specific organizations all done
for concrete ends. Consideration of the interplay of all of these diverse
factors have to be part of any normative reaction towards surveillance.
Cheers, Kevin
On 10/31/06 7:20 AM, "Roger Clarke" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Sounds like anyone who's looking for heroic resistance to rampant,
> individualism-squelching surveillance had better not look on this
> list. The ivory tower seems to have no truck with Winston Smiths.
>
> I take particular exception to the statement that "Surveillance is
> not sinister as such". Surveillance of objects perhaps not; but
> surveillance of humans has an inevitable and substantial impact on
> human behaviour. A corollary of the Hawthorne experiments was that
> humans aren't the same when they're observed. Many of us would call
> that process 'de-humanisation'. Do social scientists *really* want
> to repeat the mistakes of the physical scientists and engineers, and
> pretend that they have to avoid values-loaded research in order to
> achieve the saintly mantle of 'scientist'??
>
> I originally addressed this to my fellow information systems
> academics and professionals, but perhaps a version's needed for other
> audiences:
>
> Economic, Legal and Social Implications of Information Technology
> http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/DV/ELSIC.html
--
Kevin D. Haggerty
Department of Sociology
University of Alberta
http://www.uofaweb.ualberta.ca/sociology/haggerty.cfm
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