See also Gary T. Marx's satirical(?) review of real and imagined reviews
J.A. Beicken, in Choice Magazine
Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.
Marcella Siqueira Cassiano, in Asian Review of Criminology
Throughout the book's four sections, Marx achieves his goal of providing the reader both a conceptual map and an encyclopedic reference source of surveillance in modern Western society. Part one dissects surveillance as a social action (Weber 1978) into a series of static components. This discussion facilitates the assessment and analysis of the core concepts related to surveillance as a static category and as a process (38–39).
Part two locates surveillance practices in the real world Bas an ongoing series of events (113). Part three offers sharp and precise ideal types (Weber 1978) concerned with surveillance. In these abstracted and fictitious typologies, Marx explores different scenarios involving distinct surveillance agents: employer, parent, voyeur, and government. Organized into four chapters, this is the strongest section of these Bwindows^ into surveillance because it presents the study topic as an assemblage of intersecting meaningful social actions involving surveil- lance agents and sometimes resisting subjects.
The last section of the book discusses a series of commonly used fallacious^ justifications (269–275) for using surveillance. It also offers an Bethical roadmap in the format of a questionnaire, to assess the potential harms that surveillance can cause to the watcher (278); a dimension that, in comparison with the watched, is little explored in the field. This roadmap serves as a reminder for surveillance researchers to review their assumptions and claims (326), so they can avoid technophobia or technophilia (323–326).
Windows into the Soul draws on a multitude of resources to map the strategies and processes involved in efforts to discover information about individuals, groups, and contexts. Marx focuses therefore on the means of surveillance (20), with an emphasis on the techno- logical devices used to create and extract information. He marks a distinction between surveillance that operates through sensorial organs and forms of surveillance that occur through automated digital means. However, such devices do not operate seamlessly and must overcome assorted obstacles and restrictions—a recognition that helps to round out many existing definitions of surveillance (Lyon 2007; Jenkins 2012; Smith 2012; Haggerty and Trottier 2015). The definitions currently available tend to be more descriptive and somewhat neutral, rather than analytical and critical.
Marx organizes surveillance into nonstrategic and strategic, arguing that the latter characteristically encompasses tools and rules, as means intended to manage surveillance. The management of strategic surveillance requires tools that create or prohibit conditions of visibility and legibility and rules around the use of such tools (16). While the tools facilitate surveillance, the rules provide legitimacy. Further, he subdivides strategic surveillance into traditional surveillance, typical of preindustrial societies, and new surveillance, the type seen today and the principal subject of surveillance studies.
Relying on Weber's methodological strategy, Marx conceptualizes traditional and new sur- veillance by creating a fictional typology that accentuates their individual characteristics (50–51). In doing so, Marx isolates a few characteristics, such as tools and rules (58), for which he finds no clear and substantial evidence for contrasting both types of surveillance (57–58).
His hesitation to claim tools and rules to a lesser extent, as a distinctive characteristic of the new surveillance, raises questions about his argument: the central and distinctive characteristic of the new surveillance (46–52) stems from technical means (i.e., tools) that can convert extracted and created information into digital formats, allowing real-time data management and interpretation (49). However, by outlining his analytical uncertainties, Marx leaves the discussion unfinished, enticing the reader to seek alternative ways of theorizing nontraditional forms of surveillance.
Marx's analysis of the historical progression of surveillance leads to a nuanced examination of the dimensions of surveillance that remain fundamentally unchanged, such as the goals of surveillance. In addition to discovery and verification of information, Marx argues that surveillance serves a multiplicity of often interconnected and overlapping conceptual goals: compliance, record keeping, strategic advantage, safety, profit, self-knowledge, and curiosity.
Achieving such goals entails managing various nonmutually exclusive kinds of personal information about a Bcore identity^ (102) that are context-sensitive, such as public, private, and sensitive. Thus, an effective analysis of surveillance also requires the researcher to account for the following: the settings where surveillance takes place; the types of surveillance; the types of compliance; the substance and nature of the information collected through the many types of surveillance; and the strategies to resist and counter-resist surveillance.
Surveillance, regardless of its forms and goals, must be interpreted in action as a social process that includes continual resistance and counter-resistance. Thus, Marx's analysis includes not only surveillance technologies and techniques per se but also how surveillance practitioners and subjects feel and experience watching and being watched. In this vein, Marx warns his readers that the tools to extract and create information can overlap with the data collection process (108). However, surveillance subjects tend not to be aware of this overlap as they seldom have access to the data.
Seemingly aware of the transformation of surveillance in Asian societies, Marx reports that he conducted interviews in China and Japan. However, he does not refer to these materials in the book, nor does he explain how these interviews might have contributed to his insights. With exception of a few brief comments about China (3, 134, and 334), Windows into the Soul focuses on the shapes and trends of surveillance in the West, especially the USA. However, Marx's book can trigger insights in scholars researching the transformation of governance, deviance, and surveillance in Asian societies.
Many of Marx's arguments, if not most, apply to the transformation of surveillance in China, where data collection and creation have become increasingly softer (46), embedded in daily activities, and stored in real-time. However, with respect to the relationship of
surveillance and the notions of privacy and publicity (23–25 and 27–28), one can argue that surveillance in China operates differently than that in North America. While the new surveil- lance tends to blur the boundaries between public (society) and private (self) in North America, it tends to accentuate the boundaries between society and self in China by forging, forcing, and reinforcing new and old identities (cf. Jeffreys 2009; Wang 2005).
Marx intends Windows into the Soul to be an encyclopedic-conceptual handbook for researchers in surveillance studies. In fulfilling this goal, it also serves as a rigorous and inspiring exemplar of Weber's methodological strategies. Researchers seeking to experiment with a sociological toolkit designed to scrutinize behaviors and motives in search of meaningful similarities will certainly benefit from this book.
References
Robert Hauptman, in The Journal of Information Ethics
Windows into the Soul offers a framework for surveillance "structure, organization, practice, function, and process." Surveillance sources both traditional (data derived from unaided senses) and the new (data derived technically from multiple sources) are extensive. Surveillance for Marx is an extremely far-reaching complex of diverse activities, many of which do not at first glance appear to fall under the surveillance rubric, because social control is only part of the picture but here they nonetheless are. A large chart on cost, operation, timing, and 31 other dimensions indicates how drastically the new surveillance departs from the older form, but the goals (control, discovery, protection, verification, selling, and many others) remain constant. Additionally, less evident goals and the connections among all possibilities as well as the setting in which the various types of data are collected must be considered. And it is here that Marx provides three more extensive charts listing types of collected material (individual, shared, mobile, beliefs, etc.) as well as dimensions of information (accessible, biological, alterable, etc.) in innumerable subdivided categories. All of this occurs in a social context and thus there exist "...norms that sustain respect for the person by protecting zones of intimacy..." although it is sometimes difficult to perceive these in our surveilled environments. Social processes, culture (including lengthy fictional scenarios), and ethical considerations round out what has correctly been called a "magisterial" study. In the latter section, we find 44 techo-fallacies divided into five categories as well as an ethical framework for individual surveillance through the posing of a series of 40 questions in nine distinct categories.
This is Marx's strongpoint: A taxonomic completeness in many categories couched in a precise and expansive terminology, presented in many detailed charts and tables tells the story that he fleshes out in a 400 page narrative so overwhelming with interfering, observing, recording, testing, archiving (not to mention smelling, scanning, and snooping) that one wonders whether anything we do or say is truly private or secretive or protected. If government is harmfully invasive, corporations are worse, and unsuspected individuals may be in a position to do the most harm. There is so much diverse material in this encyclopedic overview that the publisher expunged chapters on art, music, advertisements, policy, and other topics, some of which are available on the University of Chicago Press's website at
This is usually the end of the sordid tale: We are under attack and there is little that can be done to counter the onslaught; everyone wants to know out secrets, protect us from ourselves, and sell us more junk. But here is a really big surprise: There are many ways in which the surveilling ogre can be defeated in personal relationships, under governmental scrutiny, and from corporate hegemony (in employment, consumer, and medical situations)--in person, on the street, and in cyberspace. Challenges come from "civil liberties, consumer, and worker organizations." A chart offers "Twelve neutralization moves" (avoid, distort, block, refuse). Marx holds that surveillance is a neutral entity and that context and comportment are the determining ethical factors. His final charts offer 17 points that enhance a broad surveillance (informational society, technical progress, reward-seeking subjects), but 13 that counter them (protective technologies, improved resistance, new normative protections, contraction). Marx neither affirms nor denies and yet,
Kevin Macnish, in Surveillance and Society
Windows into the Soul, a deliberate misquote of Elizabeth I (pg. 1), divides into four parts. The first two of these provide an excellent framework for analysis of surveillance, the third a collection of satirical stories that illustrate concerns with much of contemporary surveillance, and the fourth the beginning of a normative analysis. Taking these in turn, the first two parts offer a structure for analysis of what Marx has long called the "new" surveillance. Early on he distinguishes this from traditional surveillance, although it is not clear exactly where the distinction lies. This has a tendency of leading the reader to question whether a particular example given is really "new" or traditional, which can become a distraction. It was not obvious to me why
much of the analysis in this section could not equally be applied to 19th century means of surveillance, or
even those of Elizabeth I, as to the 21st century. However, it is certain that Marx has in his sights the particular target of contemporary surveillance practices.
Part I considers the contexts and structures of surveillance, the means of surveillance, the goals of surveillance, and the types of data collected. In considering means, for example, Marx raises questions regarding how comprehensive the surveillance is, who collects it, where they collect it, and what technology they have available. Turning to goals, he lists twelve concepts ranging from compliance through profit and symbolism to curiosity and self-knowledge. Here he is critical of Foucault and of those who follow Foucauldian analysis somewhat slavishly (pg. 64). While recognizing that power is unquestionably one goal of surveillance, Marx is keen to point out that it is not the only goal, nor necessarily even the most important.
Marx makes the point that "a central argument of this book is that understanding and evaluating surveillance require attention to the setting" (pg. 86), a theme to which he frequently returns. He holds that setting is crucial in drawing normative conclusions, such that "surveillance is neither good nor bad but context and comportment make it so" (pg. 284). While this is almost certainly true, his taxonomy of those contexts (consent, care, and coercion) is confusing. Surely surveillance can be consensual and caring, or caring and coercive. While "consent" and "coercion" may be a genuine dichotomy, these deal with the perspective of the surveilled subject, while "care" refers to the intention of the surveillant.
Part II of the book reads as a continuation of Part I in providing an analytic structure of surveillance, moving from static to dynamic analysis. The focus remains on providing an analytic framework through looking at alternative approaches such that actions can be categorized and understood. Here Marx takes up the changing nature of surveillance and resistance to surveillance (and responses to that resistance). He asks, for example, how goals and subjects of surveillance change over time. In this, he notes a softening of surveillance in society, contrasting Orwell's dystopia against Huxley's in recognition that surveillance does not always come about as a result of coercion but also as a result of seduction. The fact remains that many of us are as guilty in offering up reams of data about ourselves to states and corporations as those states and corporations are in helping themselves to the same.
Drawing from Erving Goffman (a clear influence throughout), Marx notes this softening in a progression of surveillance practice from maximum security prisons to non-custodial settings and activities, a "trend toward the maximum security society" (pg. 131), and suggests that Langdon Winner's function creep may be more a matter of a "surveillance gallop." At the same time, he is careful to balance these trends with evidence of a contraction of at least some surveillance practices, refusing in the process to be drawn into a simplistic "pro-" or "anti-" stance and in the process bringing home the centrality of context.
The satirical stories in the middle of the book provide a radical change in tone before Marx returns to his analytic purpose in chapters on techno-fallacies and ethics. These last are heavily abridged chapters which amount to little more than lists of concerns and an appeal to the reader to reference the complete versions on his website. In some ways this was a shame and, while a practical response to pressure to keep a book to publishable length, I would rather have seen the satirical chapters sacrificed to an online location for a fuller development of the analytic approach. I suspect that I might be in the minority, though, as the stories do make Marx's points strongly in a way that analytic prose cannot. However, I also suspect that relatively few readers will move beyond the abridged chapters to read the online explanations. I hope that my scepticism is misplaced, as this would be a loss.
While the subjects of these last chapters are not new for Marx, he does introduce novel material in the space that he has, including an impassioned plea for academics to avoid becoming activists (pgs. 273-75). He takes pains to argue for the distancing of the academic from too great an emotional engagement in the subject such that her judgment (and pronouncements) risk being clouded by bias, while also recognizing that one cannot be entirely divorced from the world one inhabits. Hence he also attempts to move beyond distanced reflection to offer normative criteria for ethical analysis. In this he focuses on the ethics of the surveillant rather than of the structure or of the surveilled subject, but without demonising the former or lionising the latter. As with his earlier approach, and consistent with his analytic approach throughout the book, he takes a ground-up view, rather than seeking over-arching theories that will explain everything. I am sympathetic to this approach, although I do think that greater coherence is possible here than Marx is willing to concede.
There is a good sense of balance throughout Windows into the Soul. It presents a picture neither of doom and gloom nor of a rosy, utopian "end of history," but, in Marx's own words, "it depends." In the final chapter he presents a list of evidence to suggest that we are rapidly approaching a surveillance Armageddon, which is immediately followed by a list demonstrating that we are moving away from a dystopian future. In an entertaining twist, both lists are introduced with quotes from the same psalm.
Critics may argue that Marx's proposed analytic framework is neither logically exhaustive nor is it necessary. There might be exceptions to his categories, although based on his experience I suspect that he would argue not. It is not even clear that a single act of surveillance might not fall under several different categories (an act, for instance, may have a number of goals, not all of them consistent). However, any metaphysician can point to a number of ways in which the world can be "sliced." The point is not necessarily to identify the correct way but to find that which is most useful. Taking this perspective, Marx's framework is both practical and approachable (unlike that of many metaphysicians) and is one that I can see many coming to use in their own analyses. For this reason alone I think that Windows into the Soul is of tremendous value. In addition, the work is entertaining throughout with a number of cartoons, references to popular culture, and a rich sense of irony.
This is a valuable work that provides an analytic framework for approaching Surveillance Studies while avoiding the temptation to find simple solutions or offer easy judgments. It should find its way onto the shelves of every serious scholar and student of surveillance.
Hanna Reichel, in Criminologia (translated from German)
Using the tools of symbolic interaction (e.g., dramaturgical analysis) learned from his teacher Erving Goffman), Marx deals not merely with contemporary technological and political developments, but with the broader "culture of surveillance", (xi). This term captures the socially created meanings regarding how surveillance technologies are perceived and applied. The goal of the book is "to advance understanding of the social and ethical aspects of personal information control and discovery as a naturally bounded, analytically coherent field". (x)
With respect to the obvious question "are you for it or against it?" Marx' answer is as distinct as it is distinguishing: "What I am for is understanding it... A central task for this book, then, is to suggest why surveillance by itself is neither good nor bad, but context and comportment make it so"(10). Marx' search is organized into four parts "that capture the rich empirical variation in surveillance settings and behavior and that feature the complexity of social orders, while nonetheless revealing patterns" (10).
Part I "Concepts: The Need for a Modest but Persistent Analycity" (11–112) presents ideas about the social structure of surveillance regarding its, types and goals. The somewhat shorter Part II "Social Processes" (113–172) contrasts with the static categories of the first part and identifies types of resistance.
Part 3 "Culture and Contexts" (173–264) is the main part of the book, not merely because of its size. Marx has used his wide-ranging experience in order to work out four case studies that are detailed and complex. As ideal types those are admittedly fictitious, yet still they represent a realistic crystallization of social and cultural ways of dealing with surveillance. The scenarios include in a program to supervise work in a high-tech company ("the Omniscient Organization"), the manifesto of the child-protection initiative ("Parents Insist on Surveillance Help Inc."), the psychiatric file of the voyeur ("Tom I. Voire") plus the speech of the entrepreneur and chair of an association for surveillance studies ("Rocky Bottoms"). These are theoretically constructed, but not simply invented out of dreams: They concentrate on hopes and fears, on ambivalences and potential dangers when people deal with surveillance technologies. This is done in a serious and knowledgeable way, often culminating in irony.
The concluding normative part IV , "Ethics and Policy" (265–322) does not offer value judgment. on surveillance techniques. Rather, again, it offers various classifications intended to prepare for drawing conclusions about coming individual cases. Fourty-four "techno-fallacies of the information age" (267), as well as reflections on reverse "fallacies" of the technophobes and on general "fallacies" of the scientific community are presented. These make clear how inconsistent and muddled debate often is. In addition Marx offers questions for identifying factors that would lead the average person to view a surveillance practice as wrong, or at least questionable (277).
In summary, the book is less a systematic monograph reporting the results of a research project, rather it can be characterized as reporting the results of decades of a scholarly involvement with cultural and societal practices of surveillance. Marx used a "relatively unstructured and opportunistic format" (7). with regard to the way interviews were conducted. The method of analytic induction based on empirical cases leading to theoretical abstraction informs the presentation, however the reader can not really identify with that procedure methodologically. The connection between the individual chapters is sort of loosely knitted. Frequently, Marx refers back explicitly or implicitly to earlier publications. Some of the material which there was not room for in the book is made available to the interested reader in the internet.
Part IV has been shortened so drastically that in its current form, it offers more of a promise than a real finished text: Marx presents his fallacies in a naked list without explanations. As a consequence, the categories are cryptic. Marx develops no great theory and no single, clearly defined conceptual framework. He pursues no hypothesis that leads any further than the insight that we need to look at complex problem areas in a differentiated, structured way, rather than reaching quick judgments. In doing that he does his readers a great service. He uses the results of his many years of high quality, scholarly work, primarily as an analytic tool for orientation without pressing his own judgments.
In the service of these intentions two methodological principles dominate the book in its various sections: Classification and visualization. Marx is devoted to distinguishing and systematizing individual aspects of the subjects areas. He offers long lists dissecting concepts, subjects and problems into sub-aspects, types and variants. For the reader this is a useful instrument for finding orientation in a complicated discipline, and it contributes much toward cooling down a heated debate, yet the reading is quite dry over stretches of text, even though the insights are frequently eye-opening.
His classifications permit Marx to present a surprising quantity of rather diverse material in a controlled way and to develop conceptualizations for future work on specific questions. This not only demonstrates impressively the broad and deep experience which Marx has at his disposal, but makes those experiences fertile for future generations of readers who, as a consequence, can build on this constructively and in a sustained way.
The second methodological means Marx applies (which is in some ways opposed to the first) —is artful visualization or illustration. In order to achieve that he frequently relies on unconventional material not usually associated with scientific work. Aphorisms taken from literature or pop music not only mark beginnings of chapters, but almost at every section, comics and internet-memes illustrate the popular imagination. In conjunction with the ideal-typical stories, they creatively fortify impressive theoretical insights in a fictive, but highly realistic way. This is all done with a twinkle of the eye. This includes empirical experiences in connection with surveillance in every day life, at the work-place and in business. This opens up for reflection facets that are bizarre, ambivalent, or dangerous.
Windows into the Soul impresses the reader through its content, as well as through its analytic stringency and the density of the material offered. With ease, Marx approaches the complex and difficult questions of contemporary surveillance culture. Without any doubt, this must be defined as his "Opus magnum" and rightfully so. However, in the reading it is much lighter and more entertaining than such a heavy title would make the reader believe.
References
Robert E. Smith, in Privacy Journal
He argues, "Financial gain drives much surveillance. This is most explicit in the case of collecting agents who are in the business to do surveillance for others. The goal for private investigators and the large information or data-warehousing and analysis industry is imply profit. They are hired guns whose goal is to sell data (and related services) apart from the ends of the purchasers. New data, public-record information, and data already gathered for other purposes are collected, repacked, and sold. The amount of information for sale is astounding. A second goal is as entertainment, publicity, symbolism, and curiosity." Marx has always peppered his scholarship with whimsy and wit, and his latest work is no exception.
Justin E. C. Tetrault, in Policing And Society: An International Journal of Research and Policy, Volume 27, 2017 - Issue 2
Marx's latest text is about surveillance and studying surveillance, detailing contemporary issues, trends, and consequences of surveillance (beyond familiar privacy concerns), while imparting an analytical toolbox for identifying and conceptualising
research problems. However, this is not to suggest that surveillance is inherently negative, as the foundation of Marx's approach is that 'surveillance by itself is neither good nor bad, but context and comportment make it so' (p10, italics in original). Accordingly, culture and values are central to Marx's analysis, as surveillance practices are harmful or helpful depending on their social context and what we value as surveillance subjects. Subsequently, readers looking for a detailed account of surveillance technologies and practices (like biometrics and spying or intelligence operations) may come up short, as—while not absent—Marx is less interested in the question of how we do surveillance, than what surveillance does to us. Windows is a sociological work that explains how surveillance is embedded in Western culture, and how such processes affect human relationships and behaviours.
Marx has a presence in Windows that awards the book personality and wit, as pages are brought to life with humour, pop culture references, cartoons, and stories (both fictional and real). This variety makes for an entertaining read and quickly dispels the
Orwellian stereotype, making surveillance relatable as a fixture of everyday life. While there is no overarching thesis that guides the text, one objective of Windows is to illustrate the banality of data collection and social control. Like race, gender, or class, the social dynamics of watching and being watched are so entrenched in Western culture that readers may wonder what is outside of surveillance. Its ubiquity and fluidity is why Marx mostly refuses strong conclusions and broad positions about what surveillance is, and what it does (it is also why Marx prefers 'the sociology of information' to 'surveillance studies').
While patterns and trends are identifiable (such as 'new' and 'old' surveillance or 'hard' and 'soft' surveillance), Marx implores readers to exercise caution when developing arguments and distinctions around the topic.While Marx's style is sharp and refreshing, his observations are familiar. Marx is not interested in revolutionising surveillance studies with Windows—he's already done that. Instead, he is guided by a 'conservative spirit' keen on tidying up the field (p.326). Like a concerned parent, early pages radiate his discontent with what is sometimes a messy and fragmented discipline. He puts it bluntly: 'concepts must be better defined and ideas better stated' and 'one must avoid the danger of making distinctions that only a social scientist could love' (pp. 6, 54). Subsequently, academic jargon is nearly absent in Windows, which some may see as a strength or weakness. Seasoned surveillance scholars, for instance, will either love or hate that Marx leafs through Foucault's panopticon (see p. 64) and mostly omits treasured surveillance concepts like 'dividuals' (Deleuze 1992), 'liquid surveillance' (Lyon 2010), and 'simulation' (Bogard 1996). Marx does not ignore these ideas, but rather, he uses his own (simpler) vocabulary, and in doing so, he admittedly offers a 'sweeping glance',
rather than an in-depth analysis of such processes (p. x).
For Marx, surveillance studies must be 'defined around concepts and stories' (p. 6, italics added), which is how Windows is organised. The first half of the text is spent articulating trends, themes, and varieties of surveillance, and Marx is skilled at developing complex social processes into terminology and scenarios easily followed by newcomers to the field—something rare in surveillance studies. The second half of Windows employs satirical fiction to illustrate the impact of surveillance on culture and behaviours.
Combining humour with serious analysis, these stories are based on Marx's decades of experience in the field and are the most enjoyable parts of the text. One chapter satirises the 'surveillophilliac' parenting industry, where children are 'investments to be protected' by designing-out bad behaviours (p. 201). Another chapter reads as a national security document championing unfettered surveillance as the future of governance, complete with a screening programme titled LOMBROSO (Legal Offensive on Murder: Brain Research Operation for the Screening of Offenders) (p. 251). While some readers may be put off by this marriage of fiction and social science, Marx reminds us that fictional works were crucial for making surveillance matter to 'the idea of democracy, the dignity of the person and the kind of society we are becoming or could become' (p. xiv). Thus, Marx's stories feel appropriate here, and work well as pedagogical devices. Like Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World, Marx's fictional narratives could be real, and are meant to provoke discussion about the values and possibilities regarding the direction of society (Huxley 2007, Orwell 2008). For instance, how much surveillance is appropriate for raising children (Chapter 8)? When should we limit information-sharing across public, private, and national institutions (Chapter 11)? How are we affected by secret surveillance only intended for consumption by the collector (Chapters 9 and 10)? There are no easy answers here, and Marx does not aim to provide them. Instead, the text is meant to equip readers with the tools to identify and wrestle with such issues.
Windows provides a 'language and conceptual guide' for understanding surveillance structures and processes (p. xv), and those teaching the topic may find it valuable to supplement Marx's concepts and stories with key readings from the field (he also provides additional material through links to his website). As a teaching resource, Windows may work best for intermediate-undergraduate- and graduate-level courses. The text will provoke discussion while offering students an extensive vocabulary to evaluate the issues. However, the number of concepts can be overwhelming at times (particularly in the early chapters), and readers may struggle to distinguish 'surveillance creep' from 'surveillance seep', 'surveillance gallop' (p. 133), 'surveillance strip', 'surveillance occasions' (p. 138), and 'surveillance slack' (p. 304)—to use some examples. Moreover, these terms often overlap and intersect, and few are universal. Put another way, Marx's distinctions might be too clean, and some may see these concepts as clutter rather than cleanliness (an absent glossary of terms makes this less forgivable).
But there is a method to the madness—Marx's lexicon of small but precise concepts is intended to contrast the dubious generalisations frequently made in surveillance scholarship ('control society' comes to mind; see Deleuze 1992). In the tradition of Orwell, Marx is calling for clarity of expression (p. 308), and Windows is as much about doing good research as it is an overview of the field. His philosophy for inquiring about surveillance can be summed up in what he calls the 'perhapsicon': 'Perhaps, sometimes, perhaps even often, but sometimes never, and in addition, make room for counter evidence, conflicting values and outcomes and new factors' (p. 308). Marx has helped surveillance studies overcome various obstacles, and Windows is about furthering the discipline by overcoming conceptual ambiguity and unreliable grand theories. Scholars would be wise to heed Marx's advice, and the text is a must-read for anyone entering the field.
References
Funding
Kevin Walby, in The American Journal of Sociology, Volume 122, Number 6 | May 2017
Marx notes the rationale for Windows into the Soul is threefold. First, surveillance has changed recently and rapidly. Technology is the main—but not the only—driver of these new developments. Second, surveillance has become "softer" (p. xv). Most surveillance barely resembles the forms of hard social control associated with, for instance, totalitarianism. Third, private forms of information gathering and analysis now outstrip public or state surveillance in many ways. The state and private corporations also liaise as part of surveillance operations as never before. Marx suggests surveillance has changed much more than he had anticipated in his earlier works published in the late 1970s and early 1980s, hence the need for this new text.
The central argument in Windows into the Soul is that the pervasive, generic character of surveillance today requires the formation of something he and others call surveillance studies (p. 13). Chapters 1–4 are dedicated to listing a plethora of terms Marx feels should be foundational to surveillance studies (e.g., cosurveillance, new surveillance, external constituency surveillance, etc.; p. 39). Most of these are Marx's own terminology. He does not spend much time justifying why these concepts are an advance over those offered by other surveillance scholars or those found in sociology or social science more generally, or testing the analytical precision of these concepts. Neither does Marx dive into the trickier question of whether surveillance studies should be conceptualized as an area or subdiscipline within sociology, or more of a multi- or interdisciplinary field. There is a debate emerging about whether surveillance studies can or should be a subdiscipline of sociology, or whether it is best positioned as an interdisciplinary field that includes political scientists and communications scholars. I would have liked to see Marx weigh in on this issue.
Chapter 6 is a condensed version of Marx's well-known essay on resisting or "neutralizing" (p. 143) surveillance processes. Chapter 7 offers an analysis of new kinds of work surveillance, notably how surveillance practices are built into the labor process in contemporary workplaces. Next, chapter 8 considers trends in surveillance of children, including the "claims made by entrepreneurs selling surveillance to parents" (p. 201). Windows into the Soul then shifts orientation. Marx offers a few creative, fictional accounts of surveillance, some of which will be known to readers. For instance, the report on Tom I. Voire is followed up by an assessment of peeping in the 21st century. After that, Marx provides a satirical speech given by a surveillance professional to a group of other watchers. These realistic fictions delve into palpable tensions created by surveillance (notably, the desire to watch others and moral dilemmas of control) in ways that more analytical discussions sometimes fail to do.
The last two chapters explore ethical issues created by surveillance. These chapters will be of interest to scholars studying the application of surveillance technology, for instance, in criminal justice settings and to those teaching undergraduate students about the dilemmas of watching and being watched. Finally, the short coda pleads with surveillance studies scholars to move beyond the "fallacy of neutrality" (p. 270) and to investigate surveillance in ways guided by C. Wright Mills's engaged, critical scholarship, a political and normative position evident throughout the book.
Windows into the Soul provides a sort of synopsis of Marx's ideas about surveillance in contemporary society. As such, it is important because of the numerous contributions Marx has made to the sociology of surveillance in the past five decades. I do think that in his attempt to study surveillance in a broad manner, he may have overlooked some issues that his political and normative position would suggest cannot be missed. For example, in his earlier work, Marx investigated police surveillance and the consequences thereof. He has also studied surveillance and inequality, the differential monitoring of certain social groups, and the effects of this. Yet these two pertinent issues do not receive much attention in Windows into the Soul. Similarly, as Christian Fuchs ("How Can Surveillance Be Defined?" Matrizes 5 [2011]: 110–33) has pointed out, defining surveillance broadly as almost any kind of watching renders the concept somewhat inept. Marx could be found guilty of the same kind of conceptual philandering.
Overall, the terms introduced by Marx are probably not as analytically clear as some readers may wish. The arguments and claims may not be substantiated empirically in the way that some bibliophiles may have hoped. But if read as a set of prompts and questions to contemplate and borrow from, sociologists, political scientists, and communications scholars studying surveillance, voyeurism, spying, and the like will view this book as valuable. Windows into the Soul is a snapshot of the work of an original, wide-ranging scholar who has done much to develop the study of surveillance.
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Sociologists have grappled with the increasing presence of surveillance in everyday life. Early notions about surveillance from Orwell to Huxley suggested apocalyptic doom. In his most recent and grandest work on the subject, Marx (emer., MIT) wrestles with the behemoth that is surveillance, attempting to synthesize the burgeoning field of surveillance studies while maintaining skepticism of its tendency toward pessimism about the implications of surveillance technologies' exponential growth. The book can be summed up with one sentence: "Surveillance is neither good nor bad but context and comportment make it so (most of the time)." (emphasis in original) Where Foucault saw increased social control, Marx acknowledges the fallibility and duality of surveillance as well as the increased possibility of resistance or neutralization. In his conceptual text, Marx is primarily interested in what the new surveillance means for knowledge. As such, he offers a conceptual map for scholars to tackle the murky moments of the new surveillance, from Snowden to polygraphs. Employing unorthodox methods for sociology, including fictional chapters, the work is an important contribution to surveillance studies and to the field of sociology as a whole.
American sociologist Charles Wright Mills once warned us that good social analyses require the continued examination and interpretation of existing materials to substantiate general statements about the shape and the trend of the subject (2000, 201–202). An exemplar of
what Mills called Bgood work, Gary T. Marx's Windows into the Soul: Surveillance and Society in an Age of High Technology offers comprehensive and critical reflections on the shapes and trends of human surveillance.
Haggerty, K. D., & Trottier, D. (2015). "Surveillance and/of nature." Society & Animals, 23(4), 400–420.
Jeffreys, E. (2009). China's governmentalities: Governing change, changing government. London: Routledge.
Jenkins, R. (2012). "Identity, surveillance and modernity." In D. Lyon, K. D. Haggerty, & K. Ball (Eds.), Routledge Handbook of Surveillance Studies (pp. 159–166). Abingdon: Routledge.
Lyon, D. (2007). Surveillance studies: An overview. Cambridge: Polity.
Mills, C. W. (2000). The sociological imagination. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Smith, G. J. D. (2012). "Surveillance work(ers)." In D. Lyon, K. D. Haggerty, & K. Ball (Eds.), Routledge Handbook of Surveillance Studies (pp. 107–115). Abingdon: Routledge.
Wang, F.-l. (2005). Organizing through Division and Exclusion: China's Hukou System. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Weber, M. (1978). Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Gary Marx has devoted much of his professional life to the study of surveillance, and Windows into the Soul gestated for at least 20 years. The topic was of some interest as early as Bentham's hypothesized Panopticon and the many actualized applications that it engendered, in hospital design for example. Warren and Brandeis peripherally touched on surveillance in their famous 1890 article and in 1967 Alan Westin produced his influential study of privacy. There followed innumerable prescient and useful works on both privacy and surveillance including pointed encyclopedias, none of which managed to stem the tide: Surveillance increased, which resulted in privacy encroachments unimaginable just a few decades earlier. Marx insists that technology is the cause and the new surveillance the result. We are inhabited and controlled by a new more potent form so pervasive that we have given in and voluntarily offer our help. Some people fret and complain about privacy arrogations and the harm they do, but even these folks do not mind sharing data and information to conveniently accomplish insignificant things such as identifying, purchasing, minor selling and earning, or the acquisition of meaningless lagniappes and, naturally, they present the world with highly personal data, information, and images on social media and the Internet. Most people unthinkingly and uncaringly share codes, financial data and sources, social security numbers, passwords, and even extremely sexually oriented images and videos. Because of all of this they lose their identities, savings, or dignity, and suffer embarrassment (or ecstasy).
The ideal ought to be a positive information society based on fairness, dignity, care, openness, trust, security, autonomy/participation, and community, rather than a negative surveillance society based on unfairness, commodification, coercion, secrecy,suspicion, insecurity, domination/repression, and atomization.
Nevertheless, the trend appears to favor oversight and we are now not far removed from an Orwellian dystopia with everyone watching (scrutinizing, to be more precise) in one way or another.
Anyone who has listened to Gary Marx talk, or spent any time on his website, will know what a truly prodigious knowledge and understanding he has of surveillance in contemporary society. This book, which David Lyon has described as Marx's maxime magnum opus, is demonstrative of this impressive grasp on the subject.
Sociologist Gary T. Marx is one of the pioneers in surveillance studies. He was one of the first to warn in 1985 that the visions of George Orwell may become a reality in what he called the "Surveillance Society" 1. His term the "New Surveillance" became crucial for identifying the change from statistical, person-oriented surveillance based on observations to a type of supervision that was carried out based on a dynamic, nationwide, data-based technology 2. Thirty years after his famous publication on under-cover police work 3. he has now published a second, far reaching monograph. This makes his thinking available to specialists, as well as to those with a broader interest in the subject.
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Gary T. Marx. Retired MIT scholar on the scrutiny of individuals through new and sophisticated technology, has written a book re-visiting his conclusions after a long career as a sort of Sixties-oriented sociology expert on surveillance and its impact on individuals' autonomy and privacy. Windows into the Soul ($35 paperback from University of Chicago Press) Marx has always peppered his scholarship with whimsy and wit, and his latest work is no exception.
*Privacy Journal, Vol. 42, no. 12
In its infancy during the 1970s, surveillance scholarship struggled to distance itself from dystopian fiction and alarmist journalism—the topic was often dismissed as sensational, marginal, and atheoretical, undeserving of academic inquiry (p. xiv). Gary Marx has played a vital role in anchoring surveillance studies as a distinct and important area of research, and in Windows into the Soul, Marx lends his experience to the now-maturing discipline that he helped to spearhead (most notably Marx 1988; see also Marx 2016). Windows is the culmination of Marx's work in the field, and includes rich empirical data comprised of over 400 interviews with surveillance subjects, practitioners, manufacturers, merchants, activists, and lawmakers—in addition to courtrecords, government reports, and periodicals. Marx's playful writing and crisp articulation make surveillance and social control approachable and coherent for inquiring minds and researchers old and new.
Bogard, W., 1996. The simulation of surveillance: hypercontrol in telematic societies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Deleuze, G., 1992. Postscript on the societies of control. October, 3–7.
Huxley, A., 2007. Brave new world. 2nd ed. London: Vintage Canada.
Lyon, D., 2010. "Liquid surveillance: the contribution of Zygmunt Bauman to surveillance studies." International political sociology, 4 (4), 325–338.
Marx, G.T., 1988. Undercover: police surveillance in America. Berkley: University of California Press.
—2016. Gary T. Marx, professor emeritus of sociology, M.I.T. [Accessed 10 November 2016].
Orwell, G., 2008. Nineteen eighty-four. London: Penguin.
This work was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada [grant number 752-2016-2115].
ORCID: Justin E. C. Tetrault http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1580-8550
From security intelligence and police monitoring to the work of credit card companies and of health agencies, surveillance is inescapable today. Indeed, as Gary T. Marx contends, surveillance should be conceived of as a pervasive, generic social process. It is pervasive across economic, political, and cultural institutions. And surveillance is generic insofar as everyone experiences and participates in it though not all in the same ways. What Marx does in Windows into the Soul is create parameters for the social scientific study of surveillance in the 21st century.
Additional Material from Windows Into the Soul
To keep the price reasonable, the material below was cut from the print edition of Windows Into The Soul. In several cases it was cut entirely (two chapters on surveillance and popular culture, an autobiographical account of five decades of working on civil rights and civil liberties issues.) In other cases chapters were significantly shortened as with those on children, Tom I. Voire, techno-fallacies, and ethics. Deleted material can be found here. All excerpts are from Gary T. Marx, Windows into the Soul: Surveillance and Society in an Age of High Technology. University of Chicago Press, 2016.
"Your Papers Please": Personal and Professional Encounters With Surveillance
Children: Slap That Baby's Bottom, Embed That ID Chip and Let it Begin
The Private Within the Public: Psychological Report on Tom I. Voire
A Mood Apart: What's Wrong with Tom?
Culture and Contexts (introduction to the print edition)
Surveillance and Popular Culture: The New Surveillance in Visual Imagery
An Ethics for the New Surveillance
Techno-Fallacies of the Information Age
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