Ghent’s penal house reframed punishment as the economic reconstruction of the lazy into workers
Evidence
The maison de force at Ghent organized penal labour above all around economic imperatives. The reason given was that idleness was the general cause of most crimes. An investigation – no doubt one of the first – carried out among those sentenced under the jurisdiction of Alost, in 1749, showed that malefactors were not ‘artisans or labourers’ (workers think only of the work that feeds them), but ‘idlers given up to begging’. … This reconstruction of homo oeconomicus excluded the use of penalties that were too short – this would prevent the acquisition of habits and skills of work – or too long – which would make any apprenticeship useless. ‘The term of six months is too short to correct criminals, and to bring them to the spirit of work’; on the other hand, ‘a life sentence throws them into despair; they become indifferent to the correction of their morals and to the spirit of work; they become concerned only with plans to escape and to rebel; and since the judgements that were passed on them did not deprive them of life, why should one seek to render it unbearable for them?’ (Vilan, 102–3). The duration of the penalty has meaning only in relation to possible correction, and to an economic use of the corrected criminal. — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 198
Categorization
- DEFINE: Introduces the ‘homo oeconomicus’ reconstruction concept — punishment redesigned around the economic utility of the corrected criminal.
- XREF: Connects to the reader’s panopticon thesis: Ghent’s work-discipline regime anticipates the productive subject-formation Foucault ties to surveillance, later mirrored in Orwell’s telescreen (internalized work/discipline). — connects to: Penal labour reshapes convicts mechanistically into docile, regularized workers — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 370; The prison disciplined convicts into an industrial labor force; The rise of the prison institutionalized the power to punish — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 209 (+1 more)
Related
- Penal labour reshapes convicts mechanistically into docile, regularized workers (similarity 0.88)
- The rise of the prison institutionalized the power to punish (similarity 0.80)
- Prison expresses bourgeois labor’s logic rather than rehabilitation’s aim (similarity 0.80)
- Penal labour’s real purpose is power relations, not production or skills (similarity 0.80)
- Penalties target the inmate’s transformation, not the exchange value of the crime (similarity 0.80)
- Imprisonment emerged with capitalism’s need for disciplined manpower (similarity 0.79)
- The carceral regime extracts knowledge that converts punishment into a productive operation. (similarity 0.78)
Broader Connections
- The prison disciplined convicts into an industrial labor force
#corroborates(0.95) - Prison disciplined workers for industrial capitalism
#corroborates(0.80) — Davis, Angela Y, Are Prisons Obsolete, 115 - The rise of the prison institutionalized the power to punish
#expands(0.75) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 209