Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Postscript on the Societies of Control

“Enclosures are molds, distinct castings, but controls are a modulation, like a self-deforming cast that will continuously change from one moment to the other, or like a sieve whose mesh will transmute from point to point.” I am a little confused about the argument that these enclosures have now turned into controls. When describing the factory, I do not see how the factory is still not “a body that contained its internal forces at a level of equilibrium, the highest possible in terms of production, the lowest possible in terms of wages.” I feel like the very control to which the author refers would strive for this equilibrium. I also do not understand the argument that hospitals are now environments of enclosure, as opposed to before. I do not see what has changed since then, and how a hospital is “equal to the harshest of confinements.” In the argument of how the corporation has turned individuals against one another in the factory, it appears to be a concern about capitalism and self gain rather than a more socialistic approach, in which “the mass and the unions who mobilized a mass resistance.” It appears the author may be saying this strive for competition and personal gain is the cause of the corporation. It was interesting when the author points out that before, everyone was always starting again in terms from school to the barracks, from the barracks to the factory, while now “one is never finished with anything.” I can see this change happening today, but I do not see it as necessarily a bad thing. These different states coexisting together happened for a reason, to make them all relevant rather than just chapters in a life.

No comments: