Bentham applied his brother's ideas on the constant observation of workers to prisons. While residing with his brother in Krichev, Bentham sketched out the concept of the panopticon in letters. : xxxviii Bentham arrived in Krichev in early 1786 and stayed for almost two years. In 1785, Jeremy Bentham, an English social reformer and founder of utilitarianism, travelled to Krichev in Mogilev Governorate of the Russian Empire (modern Belarus) to visit his brother, Samuel, who accompanied Prince Potemkin. The word panopticon derives from the Greek word for "all seeing" – panoptes. He devoted most of his efforts to developing a design for a panopticon prison, so the term now usually refers to that.Įlevated view of the panopticon prison, by Reveley, 1791 Bentham conceived the basic plan as being equally applicable to hospitals, schools, sanatoriums, and asylums. From the centre, the manager or staff are able to watch the inmates.
The architecture consists of a rotunda with an inspection house at its centre. They are effectively compelled to self-regulation.
The concept is to allow all prisoners of an institution to be observed by a single security guard, without the inmates knowing whether they are being watched.Īlthough it is physically impossible for the single guard to observe all the inmates' cells at once, the fact that the inmates cannot know when they are being watched motivates them to act as though they are all being watched at all times. The panopticon is a design of institutional building with an inbuilt system of control, originated by the English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the 18th century. This plan of Jeremy Bentham's panopticon prison was drawn by Willey Reveley in 1791.
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