Uncoding the Digital

Technology, Subjectivity and Action in the Control Society

D. Savat

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781349326013, 9780230278158
• eBook ISBN: 9781137025012
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Comparative Politics
• Index: Social Sciences

Digital media are having an enormous impact on the world. From the seemingly mundane, like playing World of Warcraft, to posting a message on Twitter or Facebook, to the operation of financial markets, to transformations in science and the economy - digital media continue to revolutionize how people live their daily life. This book challenges how we understand our relationship with our digital machines, and shows how they open up a new capacity for action in the world. A capacity for action that we should no longer simply think of in terms of movement and force, but also in terms of flow and viscosity. A capacity for action that produces a politics of fluids, and finds its expression not only in new forms of social control, but also in a renewed ability for people to engage with the world and each other.

Part I

The Database

1

The Emergence of Modulation

When two decades ago Gilles Deleuze claimed that we had shifted from a disciplinary society to a control society, he foregrounded a significant shift in the manner in which power was functioning. Already well before 9/11 it was clear that there was a mode of power emerging that was more modulatory in character, and much more focused on pre-empting contingencies. Foucault (1991; 2003) too, in his work on governmentality, had already recognized that there was something else at work that was clearly not disciplinary in character. This could be observed in various aspects of daily life, as well as in practices of government where increasingly the emphasis was on aiming to anticipate events in order to either prevent them from occurring or, indeed, try to encourage specific events to occur. What 9/11 and the subsequent War on Terror did was, as Dillon and Lobo-Guerrero (2009) phrase it, to give expression to that shift in politics, and, I argue, life more generally.

To be sure, Deleuze wasn’t the first to have announced the end of panopticism and the disciplinary society. Baudrillard (1994), for example, had made that claim long before him only a few years after the publication of Foucault’s Discipline and Punish (1979). The significant question that it raises, of course, is what a possible transition to a new mode of power that is not disciplinary in character means politically. If we accept the view that the disciplinary society has ceased to exist, then what happens to the main product of the disciplinary machine? In short, what happens to the production of the individual? This is the question Massumi poses when he asks, quoting Foucault, whether the transition in the mode of power means that ‘politically “we are dealing with natural subjects” ’ (2009, 155). This question is, in part, what I want to begin to address in this first, and the following, chapter, and is something I return to later.

It’s somewhat pointless to ponder whether Foucault would today have shared the view that the disciplinary society had been replaced. At least in his later work his view was that a disciplinary society formed part of a wider arrangement together with a society of sovereignty and a society of government (Foucault 2003; Venn 2007). My view is that it is a mistake to claim the end of the disciplinary mode of power, as Deleuze and others have done. Instead, the digitization of the disciplinary machine’s writing apparatus, in the form of databases, as well as the increased connectivity of our digital machines more generally, has significantly amplified the operation of the disciplinary machine, a point that Poster made when he argued that there is a superpanopticon in operation (1990; 1995). In my view, the mechanisms and instruments that Foucault identified as critical to the functioning of the disciplinary machine have not ceased to exist or broken down. In fact, the modes of observation by which discipline as a mode of power functions now operate more forcefully than ever, whether this be through the use of social media like Facebook, GPS location via mobile phone, radio-frequency identification (RFID), or the collection of consumer data in our day-to-day activities (Lyon 2006; 2009).

It is also clear, though, that there is something different at work, on a variety of scales, that is not disciplinary in character or rather, not necessarily only disciplinary in character. For example, when people make use of a digital machine, whether this be an app on a smart-phone that is free to download, or a ‘stand-alone’ computer game (such as Assassin’s Creed II), that action is immediately visible and recorded, with the data produced often being connected to a specific individual’s file. But interestingly, with many of our consumer actions, while there is clearly a file being produced and maintained about our consumption behavior, there isn’t necessarily any requirement or expectation in place to behave according to any specific norm. As Deleuze stated (1992), there is no mold in place anymore for an individual to adjust to. Sure, you might be penalized if you don’t pay a bill to maintain a service, which is clearly disciplinary. But in many cases, once you have purchased a product – as in the case of a game like Assassin’s Creed II – you can only make use of it once you’ve logged onto a specific network (which is free of charge) that, while claiming to be necessary to prevent software piracy, also conveniently collects data about you as a player. These data are, in part, used to anticipate what you are likely to purchase in future. Aspects of a future like that described in the novel Ubik are therefore not so far removed from us, as Katherine Hayles (2009, 62) suggests with the example of the character Joe Chip: ‘Perpetually short of cash, Joe must negotiate with the coffee pot, toaster, and even the door of his “conapt” to get them to perform routine services for which they demand instant payment.’ That instant payment could obviously be information about our use of a product.

Of course, the non-disciplinary character of the emerging new mode of power that people such as Deleuze saw emerging can be observed in less seemingly mundane examples than computer games. Certainly since 9/11 and the War on Terror, but already well before that, there has been a clear shift to pre-emptive forms of observation, whether this be in the form of anticipating consumer behavior, risk analysis, or scenario planning (Cooper 2010). Indeed, the emergence and analysis of new forms of observation has been approached in a variety of ways (Lyon 2006). While some treated this as part of the development of what Foucault called biopolitics (Clough 2008; Thacker 2005), others, such as Massumi (2009), have suggested that instead it is part of an entirely new mode of power that has been emerging over the last couple of decades, preferring instead to view this as part of a broader ecology of powers. My approach is, in the first instance, to more clearly identify the specific mechanisms and instruments by which what I term modulatory power differentiates itself from other modes of power. Crucially what I am interested in is not only coming to an understanding of how new forms of observation are part of a new mode of power that actually functions as a coherent machine or assemblage, in much the same way that the disciplinary mode of power functions as a machine according to Foucault, but also, critically, I think, understanding how different modes of power act upon, and through, the same body or subject, at times in one and the same moment. This is critical because it forms part of considering the question of how we exist, or maintain an existence in a digital age. To ask that question differently, how can we understand the simultaneous operation of a mode of power like discipline, which is squarely aimed at producing ‘useful individuals’, while on the other hand there is a mode of power emerging that, to the extent it even recognizes individuals, has no care for them, with the notion of ‘care’ itself undergoing a significant transformation (Stiegler 2009b; 2010a).

My approach here, in other words, is to treat the possible emergence of a new form of control or new mode of power not as an either/or choice. As Venn (2007, 116) indicates, the ‘anatomo-politics’ associated with discipline and a biopolitics are not mutually exclusive. It is precisely the overlap between these possibly different forms of control and modes of power that interests me, though here, following Deleuze’s approach, I focus mostly on the interaction between the disciplinary mode of power and the new modulatory mode of power. In what follows, then, it is specifically the engagement with Deleuze’s approach to understanding this new mode of power, and what effects it has on how we exist, which Deleuze termed our ‘dividuality’, that drives this first part of the book. The reason for that is because it is precisely, against what Deleuze suggested, the ongoing production of an object that is molded and we recognize as an individual, and the simultaneous ongoing production of an objectile and an anticipation of flows, which has no form, and which, taking Deleuze’s cue, I refer to in the second part of the book as a superject, that is at the core of dividuality and therefore at the core of what it means to exist in the so-called digital or control society.

The amplification of discipline

Foucault, in Discipline and Punish (1979), explained that discipline, as a mode of power, is a machine on a societal scale – a machine whose main function is to produce useful individuals, to produce useful forces out of subjected bodies. This it principally achieves by way of making things visible, and it is in that sense that Foucault saw discipline as a mode of power that is a ‘political anatomy of detail’ (1979, 39). This discipline, as a machine, achieves by way of four mechanisms, each of which is composed of specific techniques, and three instruments, using individuals ‘both as object and as instruments of its exercise’ (1979, 170). For the purposes of later on explaining how the modulatory mode of power differentiates itself from discipline, it is useful to briefly summarize these mechanisms and instruments here, as they are key to producing the specific form of individuality that Deleuze and others have suggested is no longer being produced.

The first mechanism of the disciplinary machine is that individuals are distributed in space, each space having a specific function (Foucault 1979, 141). This isn’t simply the space of the factory, or the hospital, or school but, significantly, each individual within these spaces has a specific location. The second mechanism is that the activity of individuals in each of the spaces is controlled (Foucault 1979, 149). Again, this can involve several techniques, but typically involves at least the use of a timetable, for example, which can be used to divide an activity or process into smaller elements. The third mechanism – the organization of geneses (Foucault 1979, 156) – is basically a set of techniques or machinery used to organize an individual’s training, and is critical to ensuring a standardization in the object produced – the individual – as well as in differentiating one individual from another in terms of her or his abilities. Finally, the fourth mechanism – the ‘composition of forces’ (Foucault 1979, 162) – organizes the various mechanisms, as well as each of the techniques that form part of them, in such a way as to produce the end product that we recognize as the individual. In effect it is this fourth mechanism that ensures the body becomes part of a larger ‘multi-segmentary machine’ (Foucault 1979, 164).

Effectively, it is these four mechanisms and the manner in which they function as a coherent assemblage – a machine – that produces the individual as a standardized object. Ideally this object is characterized by four features: it is cellular, organic, genetic, and, most significant of all perhaps, is combinatory. As objects they can in that regard be thought of as bricks, or ‘plug and play’ devices, in the sense that they have a defined form and are a known quantity, depending on their training of course. This means they are replaceable, and can be combined or rearranged depending on the requirements of work. In short, they are not fluid entities, even if they are mostly composed of fluids.

Some bricks can serve more specific functions, while others might have a wider use depending on the context in which they are placed. It is in this sense that individuals are molded to take on a specific form, and it is this that enables them to act with force. It is important to note that in order for the disciplinary machine to continue to produce its main product, the four mechanisms have to be intact. Without form, their capacity to act, and thereby their usefulness, is significantly reduced within a disciplinary context, and this is a point I will return to later, in both Part I and Part III, because it is precisely this production of form that is subject to interruption from the modulatory mode of power.

The three instruments by which the disciplinary machine operates – hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment, and the examination – are equally critical. So much so that Foucault credits discipline’s success to these three instruments. This is mainly because they give the disciplinary machine the simplicity and modesty that it would otherwise not have. It is precisely in these instruments that not only the operation of Foucault’s concept of power is most clearly visible, but it is here that it becomes clear what role and importance the ‘apparatus of writing’ (Foucault 1979, 189–190) has in the operation of the disciplinary machine overall. It is precisely the changes in the apparatus of writing, principally by way of databases (Poster 1990; 1995), that not only amplify the functioning and effects of the disciplinary machines but that, significantly, also produce effects that are not disciplinary in character.

That databases and the use of digital media more generally can amplify the effects of discipline is a relatively well-established point. In the first instance, by shifting to a more widespread use of digital media, the writing apparatus by which discipline operates is vastly expanded to incorporate more and more aspects of our life. We are no longer captured only by the apparatus of writing in clearly disciplinary spaces such as schools, hospitals, and offices, but increasingly outside of these spaces as well. In that respect, as our use of digital media grows, there are fewer and fewer spaces in which we are not made visible in some form (Abe 2009). Whenever we use our mobile phones, use a GPS device, look at a web page, post photos of friends or ourselves on social media, tweet something on Twitter, use our credit card to pay for groceries, the information is simultaneously recorded and sorted. As Mark Poster (1990) pointed out, we are now both the sources and recorders of information. In this sense, certainly in the past couple of decades, the field of visibility in which we could potentially be subject to the disciplinary gaze has vastly expanded (Lyon 2009). Indeed, especially when looking at the potential surveillance aspects associated with RFID tagging (Crandall 2010; Hayles 2009), the potential field of observation is expanding in quite significant ways.

Of course, the observation and recording of our actions does not always form part of a disciplinary mechanism, which I consider in more detail further on in this chapter. The point I make here is simply that in expanding the apparatus of writing we are thereby also potentially expanding, and, equally significantly, intensifying, the coercive function of observation as well as the network of relations that ‘produces “power” and distributes individuals in [a] permanent and continuous field’ (Foucault 1979, 177). For example, many people volunteer to offer information about themselves, their life outside of work, as well as their relationships to others, by way of social media like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or MySpace. While these companies themselves might not necessarily collect the information as part of a disciplinary mechanism, this doesn’t mean that the disciplinary gaze doesn’t extend to these sites. As a host of incidences reported in the popular press have demonstrated, at times this information feeds into the disciplinary machine – when an employer, or prospective employer, discovers information about an employee, their activities, or their relations to others, which then subjects the individual to discipline, typically by way of a punishment mechanism rather than a reward mechanism. Indeed, there are numerous countries where people feel very much subject to a disciplinary gaze when it comes to their use of the Internet and communications more generally.

For example, it was widely commented on in the Western press more recently that outbursts of people in China on blogs and social media regarding accusations of government corruption in relation to the high-speed train network was very unusual because ordinarily people in China, especially journalists, are far more guarded about what they say on the Internet (Hutton 2011). At the same time, the people involved in organizing the London riots in 2011 were widely reported to have deliberately avoided the use of social media like Facebook and Twitter precisely because they were aware that the authorities monitor these sites, preferring to make use of Blackberries instead – the reason being that communications through the Blackberry are encrypted and more difficult to monitor. It’s difficult to argue in the case of such examples that there is no disciplinary gaze at work, with, for example, the banning of the use of anonymous proxy servers in some countries sometimes leading to severe penalties, including the potential of death.

Equally significant in the amplification of discipline is that data can be relatively easily, and speedily, related and linked to other data that might exist on the wider network that forms the Internet. Prior to the use of our digital devices, and especially prior to the expansion of the Internet and the increased interconnectedness of these devices, there were still significant spatial as well as temporal restrictions in effect that limited the use and potential manipulation of data. In that respect a spatial annihilation of a very real kind both expands the network of relations established by the disciplinary machine, as well as brings the nodes in that network closer together. This is one of the reasons that in Australia, for example, there remains a lot of resistance to a shift to the use of networked patient records (Cresswell 2011), despite this bringing significant benefits to those working in the health sector, as well as potential benefits to patients.

One effect of the increased connectedness of the digitized writing apparatus, then, is that the instrument of normalizing judgment is significantly amplified. Indeed, through the use of digital media, it is possible to greatly extend the penal and reward mechanism by which discipline operates. As databases allow for the capture, observation, and recording of an ever greater amount and degree of detail of an individual’s actions, so...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Tables and Figures
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Part I: The Database
• Part II: The Interface
• Part III: The Network
• Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index