Foucault argued that modern policing is about shaping behavior, not just punishing crime: Punishment shifted from visible brutality (public executions) to subtle, continuous control through surveillance, classification, and normalization — creating self-policing citizens.

The Panopticon symbolizes this new form of power: Constant potential observation leads people to internalize rules and regulate themselves, making power more efficient and less visible than overt force.

Contemporary surveillance (CCTV, facial recognition, data tracking, AI) reflects Foucault’s “carceral society”: These technologies extend normalization and monitoring into everyday life, often introduced gradually (“totalitarian tiptoe”) under justifications like crime reduction or public safety, leading to widespread self-surveillance and conformity.

What is the real purpose of policing?

While previous criminal justice reformers asked how to make it more just or more humane, Michel Foucault (1926–1984) was more concerned that behind the apparent humanization of the prison system hid the guileful calculations of power. 

His landmark book Discipline and Punish (1975) traced the evolution of punishment from the age of kings to the modern world. From public executions to prisons, probation officers, social workers, risk assessments, and surveillance. At first glance this transformation appears to be a story of moral progress. Medieval rulers tortured offenders in public squares, mutilated them, branded them, or put them to death in front of cheering crowds. Modern societies, by contrast, lock offenders away in relatively humane institutions and claim to rehabilitate them.

Foucault argued that this apparent humanization concealed a deeper shift in the way power operates. In earlier centuries power was visible and dramatic. The sovereign demonstrated his authority by inflicting pain upon the body of the offender. The criminal’s suffering was a public spectacle intended to inspire fear and obedience.

Modern societies, however, discovered a far more effective means of control. Instead of breaking bodies, they began shaping behavior. Power moved from the executioner’s scaffold into schools,........

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