미셸 푸코의 파놉티시즘과 근대 교육

Abstract

With the rapid spread of the latest electronic monitoring technology, the surveilling attribute of modern society is received much attention again. This paper, on the premise that contemporary societies did not dispose of the nature of the disciplinary society while they have acquired a new character of the society of control in the late 20th century, tried to explicate that Foucault's 'panopticism' may be a useful tool for analyzing power relations in contemporary societies. While Bentham's Panopticon represented the 'ideal of perfect confinement', Foucault's panopticism implies 'the diagram of soft discipline', for which surveillance, control, and correction comprise its essential aspects. Examination, as the most important instrument of disciplinary power, synthesizes the three essential aspects of panopticism, 'surveillance-control-correction'. The concept of panopticism implied the possibility of unlimited generalization and doesn't lose its effectiveness as a model for analyzing the power relations in the contemporary societies. Foucault's panopticism involves the history of Western modern education to a certain extent. During the 19th century, the scholastic disciplinary establishment of the West had maintained the characteristic of military discipline. It was transformed gradually to a more flexible and softer one since the early 20th century. As the concept of discipline has the effect to reveal the various forgotten aspects of modern education, the concept of examination as a technology of the panoptic power will be a useful tool in historical understanding of modern education.