Have you ever been at your job and thinking about the way things work? Maybe you are mad because you can't get the day off, or because the boss asked you to work over and your significant other just happened to be cooking you a special dinner that night. You know you have no choice but to work over because the big boss man asked you to and you know it was not really a question but a demand. But on the other hand you also know that if you don't make it home for dinner you are going to be in the doghouse. Do you ever feel as if you are locked up in this place until you have "served your time" and someone else tells you that you can finally go home? Does it perhaps feel like jail? .
Michel Foucault, a leading intellectual, explains in his essay, "Panopticism", that he believes that prisons resemble the workplace in many different ways. But do we, who are actually in the working field, believe that? When first introduced to the idea, probably not. Foucault believes this is because we believe that all of these things we have been trained to do at our job are "normal". But once you look into the comparisons of the two institutions you too will see that they not only are laid out in the same way, but also function the same. We are going to examine the practices of a factory and compare it to a prison to show their striking resemblances. .
Foucault states that he believes the two main strategies that both jails and schools run under are "surveillance" and "discipline". He believes that without the strong enforcement of both of these strict principles, neither institution would be able to function.
First, let's explore what happens before a worker or an inmate is allowed to enter each institution. To ensure they know whom everyone is, they must first be enrolled. Proper registration must take place so that each inmate and worker can be identified from each other and so personal information can be recorded.