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Postscript on the Societies of Control
10 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1990
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About the author
Gilles Deleuze
253 books2,521 followersDeleuze is a key figure in poststructuralist French philosophy. Considering himself an empiricist and a vitalist, his body of work, which rests upon concepts such as multiplicity, constructivism, difference and desire, stands at a substantial remove from the main traditions of 20th century Continental thought. His thought locates him as an influential figure in present-day considerations of society, creativity and subjectivity. Notably, within his metaphysics he favored a Spinozian concept of a plane of immanence with everything a mode of one substance, and thus on the same level of existence. He argued, then, that there is no good and evil, but rather only relationships which are beneficial or harmful to the particular individuals. This ethics influences his approach to society and politics, especially as he was so politically active in struggles for rights and freedoms. Later in his career he wrote some of the more infamous texts of the period, in particular, Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus. These texts are collaborative works with the radical psychoanalyst Félix Guattari, and they exhibit Deleuze’s social and political commitment.
Gilles Deleuze began his career with a number of idiosyncratic yet rigorous historical studies of figures outside of the Continental tradition in vogue at the time. His first book, Empirisism and Subjectivity, is a study of Hume, interpreted by Deleuze to be a radical subjectivist. Deleuze became known for writing about other philosophers with new insights and different readings, interested as he was in liberating philosophical history from the hegemony of one perspective. He wrote on Spinoza, Nietzche, Kant, Leibniz and others, including literary authors and works, cinema, and art. Deleuze claimed that he did not write “about” art, literature, or cinema, but, rather, undertook philosophical “encounters” that led him to new concepts. As a constructivist, he was adamant that philosophers are creators, and that each reading of philosophy, or each philosophical encounter, ought to inspire new concepts. Additionally, according to Deleuze and his concepts of difference, there is no identity, and in repetition, nothing is ever the same. Rather, there is only difference: copies are something new, everything is constantly changing, and reality is a becoming, not a being.
He often collaborated with philosophers and artists as Félix Guattari, Michel Foucault, Guy Hocquenghem, René Schérer, Carmelo Bene, François Châtelet, Olivier Revault d'Allonnes, Jean-François Lyotard, Georges Lapassade, Kateb Yacine and many others.
Gilles Deleuze began his career with a number of idiosyncratic yet rigorous historical studies of figures outside of the Continental tradition in vogue at the time. His first book, Empirisism and Subjectivity, is a study of Hume, interpreted by Deleuze to be a radical subjectivist. Deleuze became known for writing about other philosophers with new insights and different readings, interested as he was in liberating philosophical history from the hegemony of one perspective. He wrote on Spinoza, Nietzche, Kant, Leibniz and others, including literary authors and works, cinema, and art. Deleuze claimed that he did not write “about” art, literature, or cinema, but, rather, undertook philosophical “encounters” that led him to new concepts. As a constructivist, he was adamant that philosophers are creators, and that each reading of philosophy, or each philosophical encounter, ought to inspire new concepts. Additionally, according to Deleuze and his concepts of difference, there is no identity, and in repetition, nothing is ever the same. Rather, there is only difference: copies are something new, everything is constantly changing, and reality is a becoming, not a being.
He often collaborated with philosophers and artists as Félix Guattari, Michel Foucault, Guy Hocquenghem, René Schérer, Carmelo Bene, François Châtelet, Olivier Revault d'Allonnes, Jean-François Lyotard, Georges Lapassade, Kateb Yacine and many others.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 142 reviews
November 15, 2021
WHY HAVEN'T YOU READ THIS YET?
rules automatically apply themselves to your behaviour. you don't have to regulate yourself bc the options you have within the systems are controlled in advance before you even have to make the decision. the systems modulate your future possibilities based on your data. control systems channel your access in such a way that you cannot really misbehave. it won't enclose you spatially anymore, like they did in societies of discipline. we're all modulated in advance. tfw protean-ism of Control Societies.
Man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt. It is true that capitalism has retained as a constant the extreme poverty of three-quarters of humanity, too poor for debt, too numerous for confinement: control will not only have to deal with erosions of frontiers but with the explosions within shanty towns or ghettos.
Felix Guattari has imagined a city where one would be able to leave one’s apartment, one’s street, one’s neighborhood, thanks to one’s (dividual) electronic card that raises a given barrier; but the card could just as easily be rejected on a given day or between certain hours; what counts is not the barrier but the computer that tracks each person’s position—licit or illicit—and effects a universal modulation.
...disciplinary man was a discontinuous producer of energy, but the man of control is undulatory, in orbit, in a continuous network.
Enclosures are molds, distinct castings, but controls are a modulation, like a self-deforming cast that will continuously change from one moment to the other, or like a sieve whose mesh will transmute from point to point.
rules automatically apply themselves to your behaviour. you don't have to regulate yourself bc the options you have within the systems are controlled in advance before you even have to make the decision. the systems modulate your future possibilities based on your data. control systems channel your access in such a way that you cannot really misbehave. it won't enclose you spatially anymore, like they did in societies of discipline. we're all modulated in advance. tfw protean-ism of Control Societies.
Man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt. It is true that capitalism has retained as a constant the extreme poverty of three-quarters of humanity, too poor for debt, too numerous for confinement: control will not only have to deal with erosions of frontiers but with the explosions within shanty towns or ghettos.
Felix Guattari has imagined a city where one would be able to leave one’s apartment, one’s street, one’s neighborhood, thanks to one’s (dividual) electronic card that raises a given barrier; but the card could just as easily be rejected on a given day or between certain hours; what counts is not the barrier but the computer that tracks each person’s position—licit or illicit—and effects a universal modulation.
...disciplinary man was a discontinuous producer of energy, but the man of control is undulatory, in orbit, in a continuous network.
Enclosures are molds, distinct castings, but controls are a modulation, like a self-deforming cast that will continuously change from one moment to the other, or like a sieve whose mesh will transmute from point to point.
June 15, 2022
Obviously Elliot's monologues from Mr Robot were ripped off from this. Yes, all his monologues. From this six page essay. In fact, the entire script of all four seasons is in it if you look between the lines.
April 21, 2022
Clearly written and amazingly prescient for 1990.
Deleuze understood Foucault, saw the transition happening, stared dead-eyed into the future, and wrote this quick summary of what ours lives were about to turn into.
Amazing.
Deleuze understood Foucault, saw the transition happening, stared dead-eyed into the future, and wrote this quick summary of what ours lives were about to turn into.
Amazing.
Read
September 7, 2020Disciplinary societies are represented by spaces of enclosure. In the disciplinary society, the individual passes between closed environments, each with its own laws. These closed environments include the family, the school, the barracks, the factory, the hospital, the prison. Foucault analysed the ideal project of these environments: to concentrate, to distribute in space, to order in time, and to compose a productive force whose “effect will be greater than the sum of its component forces.”
[Writing in 1990] Deleuze explains here that the disciplinary society succeeded the society of sovereignty, and the disciplinary society is itself in the process of being succeeded by the society of control. The old disciplines, operating within closed systems, have been replaced by forms of free-floating control. Which of these regimes is the more tolerable? This is not pertinent. What is is that within each society is the confrontation of both liberating and enslaving forces. Whilst the changes in environments of enclosure may express new freedom, they may also participate in mechanisms of control that are equal to the harshest of confinements.
In section two of the essay, Deleuze compares the disciplinary society and the society of control, observing the main differences between the two. Whereas the enclosures representative of disciplinary society represent distinct molds that individuals pass through, controls are a modulation, a self-deforming cast that continually changes from one moment to the other. This can be seen in the difference between the factory and the corporation. The factory was a stable body, containing its internal forces at a level of equilibrium. The corporation, however, is a spirit, a gas: unstable, transmutative. The relationship between individuals with each type of society differs, also. The factory constituted individuals as a single body. This was to the double advantage of the boss, who surveyed each element within the mass, and the unions, who mobilized a mass resistance. The corporation, however, pushes rivalry between individuals, who are pressed to compete with each other.
The modulating principle has also found its way into national education. The school is replaced by perpetual training, and the examination is replaced by continuous control. In the disciplinary societies, movement between each individual institution (e.g., from the school to the factory) was discretized, one was always starting again. However, in the societies of control, one is never finished with anything – the corporation and the education system are coexisting states within the same modulation, within a system of deformation. Deleuze illustrates this point with the two types (barring the third type, the impossible absolute acquittal) of acquittal found in Kafka's The Trial. The apparent acquittal, the temporary stop, of disciplinary societies, whereby the acquitted individual is between two incarcerations, is replaced by the protracted process of limitless postponements of the societies of control, whereby the individual's status is in continuous variation.
In the disciplinary society, consisting of two poles, there is the individual, represented by the signature, who has a position within a mass, this position being indicated by an administrative number. In the society of control we no longer find ourselves dealing with the mass/ individual. Individuals (indivisible units) have become dividuals (units that are not self-contained and may be broken down). Masses, on the other hand, have become data. Deleuze uses the change in the money referred to in each society to further express the distinction between the two societies. Where the disciplinary society referred back to minted money, with gold as the numerical standard, the society of control relates to floating rates of exchange, modulated according to a set of standard currencies.
While the disciplinary man was a discontinuous producer of energy, the man of control is undulatory, in a continuous network. This can be seen in the types of machines matched with each society. The machines of the disciplinary society involved energy, involving the danger of sabotage of the individual machines. On the other hand, the societies of control operate with computers, linked in a network, which involve the danger of the introduction of viruses to the network of machines. This technological evolution is a mutation of capitalism. The capitalism of the disciplinary society is a capitalism for production and property, represented by the factory, a space of enclosure, with the capitalist being the owner of the means of production. However, in the society of control, capitalism is no longer involved in production (which is often relegated to the Third World). It is a capitalism for the product, a dispersive capitalism that wants to sell and market, rather than a contained capitalism for production. Distinct analogical spaces (the family, the school, the army, the factory), converging towards an owner, are replaced by the coded figures of a single corporation, the owner replaced with stockholders. Markets are conquered in the capitalism of the disciplinary society by specialization, by colonization, by lowering the costs of production; whereas they are conquered in the capitalism of the society of control by grabbing control, by exchange rate fixing, by the transformation of the product.
Deleuze concludes section two by claiming that marketing has become the “soul” of the corporation and that this positing of the soul of the corporation is “the most terrifying news in the world.” While control is short-term and of rapid rates of turnover, it is also continuous and without limit, where discipline was of long duration, finite*, and discontinuous. “The operation of markets is now the instrument of social control […] man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt.”
Deleuze opens section three referring to Felix Guattari, who has imagined a city where an individual, traversing the city, is granted access to certain areas according to an “(dividual) electronic card that raises a given barrier.” This illustrates the difference between the control society as a whole and the disciplinary society. A control mechanism gives the position of any element within an open environment at any given instant. Whereas in the disciplinary society the barrier itself is what counts, in the society of control the barrier is not so important as the “computer that tracks each person's position – licit or illicit – and effects a universal modulation.” The card may be rejected, for example, on a particular day or between certain hours – this modulation rules over the barrier itself.
The essay is concluded with a call for the study of the crisis of the disciplinary sites of enclosure. Deleuze [writing in 1990] proclaims that “what counts is that we are at the beginning of something,” and lists examples of some of the nascent changes in the principle disciplinary systems (the prison system; the school system; the hospital system; the corporate system). He explains that these examples allow for a better understanding of the “progressive and dispersed installation of a new system of domination,” of what is meant by the crisis of the institutions. He questions whether the previous forms of resistance in the disciplinary society (namely, the unions) will be able to adapt, or whether they will give way to new forms of resistance.
“There is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons.”
* Note: the essay actually reads “Control is short-term and of rapid rates of turnover, but also continuous and without limit while discipline was of long duration, infinite and discontinuous.” I believe, and have assumed, that the word “infinite” is an error and should read “finite”.
[Writing in 1990] Deleuze explains here that the disciplinary society succeeded the society of sovereignty, and the disciplinary society is itself in the process of being succeeded by the society of control. The old disciplines, operating within closed systems, have been replaced by forms of free-floating control. Which of these regimes is the more tolerable? This is not pertinent. What is is that within each society is the confrontation of both liberating and enslaving forces. Whilst the changes in environments of enclosure may express new freedom, they may also participate in mechanisms of control that are equal to the harshest of confinements.
In section two of the essay, Deleuze compares the disciplinary society and the society of control, observing the main differences between the two. Whereas the enclosures representative of disciplinary society represent distinct molds that individuals pass through, controls are a modulation, a self-deforming cast that continually changes from one moment to the other. This can be seen in the difference between the factory and the corporation. The factory was a stable body, containing its internal forces at a level of equilibrium. The corporation, however, is a spirit, a gas: unstable, transmutative. The relationship between individuals with each type of society differs, also. The factory constituted individuals as a single body. This was to the double advantage of the boss, who surveyed each element within the mass, and the unions, who mobilized a mass resistance. The corporation, however, pushes rivalry between individuals, who are pressed to compete with each other.
The modulating principle has also found its way into national education. The school is replaced by perpetual training, and the examination is replaced by continuous control. In the disciplinary societies, movement between each individual institution (e.g., from the school to the factory) was discretized, one was always starting again. However, in the societies of control, one is never finished with anything – the corporation and the education system are coexisting states within the same modulation, within a system of deformation. Deleuze illustrates this point with the two types (barring the third type, the impossible absolute acquittal) of acquittal found in Kafka's The Trial. The apparent acquittal, the temporary stop, of disciplinary societies, whereby the acquitted individual is between two incarcerations, is replaced by the protracted process of limitless postponements of the societies of control, whereby the individual's status is in continuous variation.
In the disciplinary society, consisting of two poles, there is the individual, represented by the signature, who has a position within a mass, this position being indicated by an administrative number. In the society of control we no longer find ourselves dealing with the mass/ individual. Individuals (indivisible units) have become dividuals (units that are not self-contained and may be broken down). Masses, on the other hand, have become data. Deleuze uses the change in the money referred to in each society to further express the distinction between the two societies. Where the disciplinary society referred back to minted money, with gold as the numerical standard, the society of control relates to floating rates of exchange, modulated according to a set of standard currencies.
While the disciplinary man was a discontinuous producer of energy, the man of control is undulatory, in a continuous network. This can be seen in the types of machines matched with each society. The machines of the disciplinary society involved energy, involving the danger of sabotage of the individual machines. On the other hand, the societies of control operate with computers, linked in a network, which involve the danger of the introduction of viruses to the network of machines. This technological evolution is a mutation of capitalism. The capitalism of the disciplinary society is a capitalism for production and property, represented by the factory, a space of enclosure, with the capitalist being the owner of the means of production. However, in the society of control, capitalism is no longer involved in production (which is often relegated to the Third World). It is a capitalism for the product, a dispersive capitalism that wants to sell and market, rather than a contained capitalism for production. Distinct analogical spaces (the family, the school, the army, the factory), converging towards an owner, are replaced by the coded figures of a single corporation, the owner replaced with stockholders. Markets are conquered in the capitalism of the disciplinary society by specialization, by colonization, by lowering the costs of production; whereas they are conquered in the capitalism of the society of control by grabbing control, by exchange rate fixing, by the transformation of the product.
Deleuze concludes section two by claiming that marketing has become the “soul” of the corporation and that this positing of the soul of the corporation is “the most terrifying news in the world.” While control is short-term and of rapid rates of turnover, it is also continuous and without limit, where discipline was of long duration, finite*, and discontinuous. “The operation of markets is now the instrument of social control […] man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt.”
Deleuze opens section three referring to Felix Guattari, who has imagined a city where an individual, traversing the city, is granted access to certain areas according to an “(dividual) electronic card that raises a given barrier.” This illustrates the difference between the control society as a whole and the disciplinary society. A control mechanism gives the position of any element within an open environment at any given instant. Whereas in the disciplinary society the barrier itself is what counts, in the society of control the barrier is not so important as the “computer that tracks each person's position – licit or illicit – and effects a universal modulation.” The card may be rejected, for example, on a particular day or between certain hours – this modulation rules over the barrier itself.
The essay is concluded with a call for the study of the crisis of the disciplinary sites of enclosure. Deleuze [writing in 1990] proclaims that “what counts is that we are at the beginning of something,” and lists examples of some of the nascent changes in the principle disciplinary systems (the prison system; the school system; the hospital system; the corporate system). He explains that these examples allow for a better understanding of the “progressive and dispersed installation of a new system of domination,” of what is meant by the crisis of the institutions. He questions whether the previous forms of resistance in the disciplinary society (namely, the unions) will be able to adapt, or whether they will give way to new forms of resistance.
“There is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons.”
* Note: the essay actually reads “Control is short-term and of rapid rates of turnover, but also continuous and without limit while discipline was of long duration, infinite and discontinuous.” I believe, and have assumed, that the word “infinite” is an error and should read “finite”.
January 20, 2021
INSANELY good. You should read this yesterday.
''There is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons.''
''There is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons.''
Read
June 24, 2019Taking the baton from Foucault, Deleuze in this brief essay articulates some simple yet profound notions apropos of our transition from a society of discipline to a society of control. Early capitalism sought to manage with great detail various environments of enclosure, whereas our modern (written in the 90s but equally relevant today) societies are more concerned with amorphous mechanisms of control that modulate ceaselessly, marking a shift away from the discontinuity of the societies of discipline. As control spreads its reach into all areas of social life, Deleuze offers that "there is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons." This very Spinozan sentiment has been playing on my mind a lot. As he often does, Deleuze prompts us not to look for meaning, but to consider how things function, how they can function.
He goes on to demarcate shifts in capitalist activity: how the equal salary has given way to the competitive salary; it's a competition! bonuses! who is the most motivated (towards the end of the essay he remarks: many young people strangely boast of being "motivated"... It's up to them to discover what they're being made to serve)? The old dualism between the individual and the mass that he constitutes has given way to the "dividual", a divided and separate unit of the mass, which comes to be seen as a set of data. Production used to occur in discrete enclosures but now never ceases flowing. Capitalism in fact no longer really even produces at all in its central "capitalist" areas, production itself has become delegated to the periphery, the great capitalist entities buy the already finished product! Capitalism can now dedicated the entirety of its energy into the marketing of the product. "We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world."
Deleuze's reference to Guattari in the final chapter is perhaps the most pertinent feature here. Guattari's 'vision' of an electronic card that grants (or denies) access to neighbourhoods, cities, streets, etc. but most importantly tracks a subject's position at all times, is our concrete smartphone reality. Our spatio-temporal tracking is unquestioned, a given, accepted at this point. We can witness these "modulations" in real time: a google search or a trip into a new town or restaurant is enough to trigger a new wave of customized adverts. Our deepest and shallowest thoughts are immanent to the new mechanisms of control; all forming an ever increasing network of points, flows and patterns.
It's worth repeating: "there is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons."
He goes on to demarcate shifts in capitalist activity: how the equal salary has given way to the competitive salary; it's a competition! bonuses! who is the most motivated (towards the end of the essay he remarks: many young people strangely boast of being "motivated"... It's up to them to discover what they're being made to serve)? The old dualism between the individual and the mass that he constitutes has given way to the "dividual", a divided and separate unit of the mass, which comes to be seen as a set of data. Production used to occur in discrete enclosures but now never ceases flowing. Capitalism in fact no longer really even produces at all in its central "capitalist" areas, production itself has become delegated to the periphery, the great capitalist entities buy the already finished product! Capitalism can now dedicated the entirety of its energy into the marketing of the product. "We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world."
Deleuze's reference to Guattari in the final chapter is perhaps the most pertinent feature here. Guattari's 'vision' of an electronic card that grants (or denies) access to neighbourhoods, cities, streets, etc. but most importantly tracks a subject's position at all times, is our concrete smartphone reality. Our spatio-temporal tracking is unquestioned, a given, accepted at this point. We can witness these "modulations" in real time: a google search or a trip into a new town or restaurant is enough to trigger a new wave of customized adverts. Our deepest and shallowest thoughts are immanent to the new mechanisms of control; all forming an ever increasing network of points, flows and patterns.
It's worth repeating: "there is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons."
July 12, 2022
My philosophy professor would be proud of this.
The text made very little sense to me at the level of:
1. The words used - pointlessly complex and convoluted - "...forming a system of variable geometry the language of which is numerical..." or "... what is important is no longer either a signature or a number, but a code: the code is a password, while on the other hand the disciplinary societies are regulated by watchwords..."
2. the arguments presented - "Enclosures are molds, distinct castings, but controls are a modulation, like a self-deforming cast that will continuously change from one moment to the other, or like a sieve whose mesh will transmute from point to point." - plis halp.
3. the logic it followed - "This is obvious in the matter of salaries: the factory was a body that contained its internal forces at a level of equilibrium, the highest possible in terms of production, the lowest possible in terms of wages; but in a society of control, the corporation has replaced the factory, and the corporation is a spirit, a gas. Of course the factory was already familiar with the system of bonuses, but the corporation works more deeply to impose a modulation of each salary, in states of perpetual metastability that operate through challenges, contests, and highly comic group sessions. If the most idiotic television game shows are so successful, it’s because they express the corporate situation with great precision." - People used to be paid the same wage in factories, they are now paid different salaries in corporations. The TV game show is successful because people have different outcomes? Also, the corporation is a gas. - PLIS HALP.
The only part I was very clearly able to understand was "We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world." Which wasn't quite as terrifying as the rest of the text.
I read through it because it was 6 pages and reminded me of at least a few rather entertaining and un-understandable classes in college.
The text made very little sense to me at the level of:
1. The words used - pointlessly complex and convoluted - "...forming a system of variable geometry the language of which is numerical..." or "... what is important is no longer either a signature or a number, but a code: the code is a password, while on the other hand the disciplinary societies are regulated by watchwords..."
2. the arguments presented - "Enclosures are molds, distinct castings, but controls are a modulation, like a self-deforming cast that will continuously change from one moment to the other, or like a sieve whose mesh will transmute from point to point." - plis halp.
3. the logic it followed - "This is obvious in the matter of salaries: the factory was a body that contained its internal forces at a level of equilibrium, the highest possible in terms of production, the lowest possible in terms of wages; but in a society of control, the corporation has replaced the factory, and the corporation is a spirit, a gas. Of course the factory was already familiar with the system of bonuses, but the corporation works more deeply to impose a modulation of each salary, in states of perpetual metastability that operate through challenges, contests, and highly comic group sessions. If the most idiotic television game shows are so successful, it’s because they express the corporate situation with great precision." - People used to be paid the same wage in factories, they are now paid different salaries in corporations. The TV game show is successful because people have different outcomes? Also, the corporation is a gas. - PLIS HALP.
The only part I was very clearly able to understand was "We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world." Which wasn't quite as terrifying as the rest of the text.
I read through it because it was 6 pages and reminded me of at least a few rather entertaining and un-understandable classes in college.
Read
August 26, 2022"We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world."
Reading Mark Fisher's "Capitalist Realism" piqued my curiosity in Deleuze's work, seeing as Fisher seems to be quite taken by his ideas, and this essay proved to be a good starting point. In it, Deleuze asserts that a shift from a disciplinary society (Foucault) to a "society of control" has taken place, and what that means for us as individuals.
Anyway, it's a fairly short and succinct essay, so definitely worth a read.
Reading Mark Fisher's "Capitalist Realism" piqued my curiosity in Deleuze's work, seeing as Fisher seems to be quite taken by his ideas, and this essay proved to be a good starting point. In it, Deleuze asserts that a shift from a disciplinary society (Foucault) to a "society of control" has taken place, and what that means for us as individuals.
Anyway, it's a fairly short and succinct essay, so definitely worth a read.
August 31, 2023
A short but palpable read.
Deleuze continues to be an incredibly intriguing thinker. While his points can often be obfuscated in his twisting and sprawling layers of abstraction, Postscripts on Societies of Control offers a gentler foray into his works and politics.
Building on the concepts of Focoult before him, Deleuze describes not a disciplinary society, (one in which its constituents are made complacent under threat of disciplinary action and surveillance), but one in which they are reduced to quantifiable binaries to be segmented and steered. Individuals become “dividuals”. A separate entity but one without true individuation.
No longer are the days of direct punishment. Instead, debt anatomies hold citizens hostage to a life of perpetual serfdom. Always training, always striving for improvement. In a competitive world where corporations hold all the the cards, it’s a race to the bottom for even the skilled worker.
The corporation subsumes all. Academia, Government, the family life.
A prison which encapsulates not with barriers. But with personally identifiable information, all telemetry to be monitored, analyzed.
What Deleuze paints is a bleak image of our contemporary time. There was a brief period where consumers almost took power. Made capital our bitch. Now, corporations have every institution and individual in check.
In the west we have been quick to judge other regimes for instituting wholly oppressive structures, but are we already there ourselves?
If the answer is yes.
Then as Deleuze once said: “There's no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons.”
Deleuze continues to be an incredibly intriguing thinker. While his points can often be obfuscated in his twisting and sprawling layers of abstraction, Postscripts on Societies of Control offers a gentler foray into his works and politics.
Building on the concepts of Focoult before him, Deleuze describes not a disciplinary society, (one in which its constituents are made complacent under threat of disciplinary action and surveillance), but one in which they are reduced to quantifiable binaries to be segmented and steered. Individuals become “dividuals”. A separate entity but one without true individuation.
No longer are the days of direct punishment. Instead, debt anatomies hold citizens hostage to a life of perpetual serfdom. Always training, always striving for improvement. In a competitive world where corporations hold all the the cards, it’s a race to the bottom for even the skilled worker.
The corporation subsumes all. Academia, Government, the family life.
A prison which encapsulates not with barriers. But with personally identifiable information, all telemetry to be monitored, analyzed.
What Deleuze paints is a bleak image of our contemporary time. There was a brief period where consumers almost took power. Made capital our bitch. Now, corporations have every institution and individual in check.
In the west we have been quick to judge other regimes for instituting wholly oppressive structures, but are we already there ourselves?
If the answer is yes.
Then as Deleuze once said: “There's no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons.”
October 4, 2022
“We no longer find ourselves dealing with the mass/individual pair. Individuals have become “dividuals,” and masses, samples, data, markets, or banks.”
Following the path of Foucault, here Deleuze sets out to analyse mechanism of the societies of control while Foucault was analysing the disciplinary society. And it certainly took a shift from disciplinary society to society of control near the end of twentieth century. But now it is even explicit and more brutal. As if ironically Deleuze was predicting our own behaviour, and how we might be controlled in this age of late capitalism, where capitalism doesn’t produce,they buy stocks and sell comforts.
Following the path of Foucault, here Deleuze sets out to analyse mechanism of the societies of control while Foucault was analysing the disciplinary society. And it certainly took a shift from disciplinary society to society of control near the end of twentieth century. But now it is even explicit and more brutal. As if ironically Deleuze was predicting our own behaviour, and how we might be controlled in this age of late capitalism, where capitalism doesn’t produce,they buy stocks and sell comforts.
Read
August 28, 2024I’m not sure if it fits perfectly, but this meme was on my mind the whole time.
Society: Be yourself
Also Society: Not like that
I heard that a book I want to read references this essay a lot. Since it’s just 10 pages, I figured, why not get it over with?
(But I’m not sure I fully understood it👀)
Society: Be yourself
Also Society: Not like that
I heard that a book I want to read references this essay a lot. Since it’s just 10 pages, I figured, why not get it over with?
(But I’m not sure I fully understood it👀)
August 3, 2025
majko sveta zbog uvoda sam mislila da je ovo o arhitekturi. APSOLUTNO van moje domene znanja, sigurno ću ponovo pročitati.
ovo iduce su samo neke brljotine koje sam zapisala da iduci put dok budem citala znam sta sam prvi puta razmisljala:
pocela sam citati na engleskom i nisam uspjela razumijeti. tad sam trebala znati da ce ovo biti van mog dosega. nista pronaci xu ja na hrvatskom, naravno na hrvatskom nema ali ima na srpskom (mislim znam sto kasarna znaci). zapravo i spominje arhitekturu ali vise kao simbol i njenu sporednu ulogu koja se mijenja na prelasku iz disciplinarnog društva u društvo kontrole. - u biti djelomicno prica o rivalstvu kojeg trenutni sistem potice u skolstvu, radnom mjestu itd. podsjeca me na fenomen samo-provjere i samo-ispravka, poput promatraca unutar osobe (na shemu sagrjesenja u mislima kod krscanstva ali i unutarnjeg promatraca iz Margaret Atwoodinge knjige Modrobrada) mozda sam krivo shvatila tekst 👐
za 2. dio nazvan Teorija sam imala osjecaj kao da sam citala natalnu kartu a ne neko ozbiljno djelo su mi recenice cudno slozene i izrazi su zastarjeli ili ih nikad ucila. sigurna sam da su njegovih par kolega zabrinuto citali ovaj tekst i slagali se s njime ali meni nije prenijelo informacija jer sam nepripremljena procitala. upsi pinterest me nagovorio.
shvacam samo da je tu negdje objasnjenje zasto ja vise ne mogu otici na neciju farmu izmisliti novo ime i raditi kao konjusar.
više djeluje kao djelo paranoje ali zanimljivo svakako.
ovo iduce su samo neke brljotine koje sam zapisala da iduci put dok budem citala znam sta sam prvi puta razmisljala:
pocela sam citati na engleskom i nisam uspjela razumijeti. tad sam trebala znati da ce ovo biti van mog dosega. nista pronaci xu ja na hrvatskom, naravno na hrvatskom nema ali ima na srpskom (mislim znam sto kasarna znaci). zapravo i spominje arhitekturu ali vise kao simbol i njenu sporednu ulogu koja se mijenja na prelasku iz disciplinarnog društva u društvo kontrole. - u biti djelomicno prica o rivalstvu kojeg trenutni sistem potice u skolstvu, radnom mjestu itd. podsjeca me na fenomen samo-provjere i samo-ispravka, poput promatraca unutar osobe (na shemu sagrjesenja u mislima kod krscanstva ali i unutarnjeg promatraca iz Margaret Atwoodinge knjige Modrobrada) mozda sam krivo shvatila tekst 👐
za 2. dio nazvan Teorija sam imala osjecaj kao da sam citala natalnu kartu a ne neko ozbiljno djelo su mi recenice cudno slozene i izrazi su zastarjeli ili ih nikad ucila. sigurna sam da su njegovih par kolega zabrinuto citali ovaj tekst i slagali se s njime ali meni nije prenijelo informacija jer sam nepripremljena procitala. upsi pinterest me nagovorio.
shvacam samo da je tu negdje objasnjenje zasto ja vise ne mogu otici na neciju farmu izmisliti novo ime i raditi kao konjusar.
više djeluje kao djelo paranoje ali zanimljivo svakako.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 19, 2021
One of the most brilliant synthesizes of modern capitalism, all done in such a small amount of pages.
As Deleuze says in the essay, "There is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons".
As Deleuze says in the essay, "There is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons".
December 9, 2022
Deleuzianpilled a las 2:16
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January 20, 2025“It's a capitalism of higher-order production. It no longer buys raw materials and no longer sells the finished products: it buys the finished products or assembles parts. What it wants to sell is services and what it wants to buy is stocks. This is no longer a capitalism for production but for the product, which is to say, for being sold or marketed. Thus it is essentially dispersive, and the factory has given way to the corporation. The family, the school, the army, the factory are no longer the distinct analogical spaces that converge towards an owner-state or private power-but coded figures— deformable and transformable-of a single corporation that now has only stockholders.”
“The conquests of the market are made by grabbing control and no longer by disciplinary training, by fixing the exchange rate much more than by lowering costs, by transformation of the product more than by specialization of production.”
“Marketing has become the center or the "soul" of the corporation. We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world. The operation of markets is now the instrument of social control and forms the impudent breed of our masters.”
“The conquests of the market are made by grabbing control and no longer by disciplinary training, by fixing the exchange rate much more than by lowering costs, by transformation of the product more than by specialization of production.”
“Marketing has become the center or the "soul" of the corporation. We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world. The operation of markets is now the instrument of social control and forms the impudent breed of our masters.”
December 12, 2023
Yes this was 10 pages and yes I’m trying to hit that Goodreads goal.
“We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world”.
“The individual never ceases passing from one closed environment to another, each having its own laws”. These laws are proscribed by systems of control instantiated by neoliberalism. Their dispersive nature makes any organized affront useless, yet somehow they are still able to be realized in our physical spaces.
Brings to mind Garcin’s line about ‘blinking’ in Sartre’s ‘No Exit’. When there’s no escape from the barrage of information one can calm the mind with a blink. A built in reset button, and the only respite offered when there’s no place to go with true freedom of choice.
“We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world”.
“The individual never ceases passing from one closed environment to another, each having its own laws”. These laws are proscribed by systems of control instantiated by neoliberalism. Their dispersive nature makes any organized affront useless, yet somehow they are still able to be realized in our physical spaces.
Brings to mind Garcin’s line about ‘blinking’ in Sartre’s ‘No Exit’. When there’s no escape from the barrage of information one can calm the mind with a blink. A built in reset button, and the only respite offered when there’s no place to go with true freedom of choice.
July 14, 2022
Short and packed with meaning. I also recommend the commentary of James Brusseau (aprox. 20 pages long) on this postscript as it offers a glimpse of how societies of control have evolved, 30 years after Deleuze's postscript. Search for "Societies of Control Updated for Big Data and Predictive Analytics".
September 14, 2024
" we are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world "
There's no way that was written in 1990
There's no way that was written in 1990
March 5, 2025
we are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world.
March 25, 2021
'We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world.'
A very short text, but eerily prophetic. It is not a simple read and some prior knowledge on Foucault and his thesis on disciplinary societies is necessary. Yet, for such a short text to engage with such complex and large ideas is admirable, and proves Deleuze's skill as a writer. In brief, Postscript on the Societies of Control is a description of a capitalist mutation that emerged in the 1980s, and that has taken greater form today. The factory has been replaced by the corporation. The mechanisms of control have changed: 'Man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt.' Western capitalism is no longer interested in production; the act of production has been relegated to the Third World. Since Thatcher, we no longer buy raw materials and sell finished products. Instead, we sell services and buy stocks. 'This is no longer capitalism for production,' writes Deleuze, 'but for the product'.
A very short text, but eerily prophetic. It is not a simple read and some prior knowledge on Foucault and his thesis on disciplinary societies is necessary. Yet, for such a short text to engage with such complex and large ideas is admirable, and proves Deleuze's skill as a writer. In brief, Postscript on the Societies of Control is a description of a capitalist mutation that emerged in the 1980s, and that has taken greater form today. The factory has been replaced by the corporation. The mechanisms of control have changed: 'Man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt.' Western capitalism is no longer interested in production; the act of production has been relegated to the Third World. Since Thatcher, we no longer buy raw materials and sell finished products. Instead, we sell services and buy stocks. 'This is no longer capitalism for production,' writes Deleuze, 'but for the product'.
May 16, 2023
As it turned out, Deleuze's essay on the society of control, written in the early 90s, was a real prophecy. Nowadays, each of us can observe the process of necrosis of old distinct castings(molds) and the proliferation of a single space of modulation, which can be presented as self-transforming metal. The corporation replaces the factory not only as a main means of production, but also as a substitute for previous spaces of enclosure (school, hospital, prison, factory itself).
The essay essentially continues Foucault's theory, outlined in "Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison", by introducing certain innovations that were revealed during Foucault's lifetime, but which he couldn't clearly describe, due to the initial stage of their genesis.
Clearly, a must-read for people interested in French philosophy.
The essay essentially continues Foucault's theory, outlined in "Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison", by introducing certain innovations that were revealed during Foucault's lifetime, but which he couldn't clearly describe, due to the initial stage of their genesis.
Clearly, a must-read for people interested in French philosophy.
April 13, 2022
"We are taught that corporarions have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world. The operation of markets is now the instrument of social control and forms the impudent breed of our masters."
"Man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt."
"Man is no longer man enclosed, but man in debt."
November 16, 2021
probably the most interesting contribution of G Deleuze on politics
December 4, 2021
long read
March 27, 2022
Visionario, perturbador, motivador.
January 2, 2025
"Los anillos de las serpientes
son aún más complicados que los orificios de una madriguera de topo"
Espacios físicos (centros de encierros) vs espacios virtuales o híbridos (tecnología) control "al aire libre"
Es interesante reflexionar acerca de la noción del espacio y las sociedades de control. Yo particularmente lo vinculo muchísimo con la crisis sanitaria por COVID y cómo el concepto de espacio se replanteó completamente derivando en otras complicaciones referentes a esto que habla Deleuze de la modulación y los diferentes controladores.
Este texto me recuerda mucho a los debates post humanistas. Cada vez es más difícil identificar qué nos controla como sociedad y aún identificando ciertos patrones (porque son demasiados) todo se reduce a: que cosas "crees" que no estas dejando que te controlen y que cosas realmente te están controlando.
PD: absolutamente todo te controla :)
son aún más complicados que los orificios de una madriguera de topo"
Espacios físicos (centros de encierros) vs espacios virtuales o híbridos (tecnología) control "al aire libre"
Es interesante reflexionar acerca de la noción del espacio y las sociedades de control. Yo particularmente lo vinculo muchísimo con la crisis sanitaria por COVID y cómo el concepto de espacio se replanteó completamente derivando en otras complicaciones referentes a esto que habla Deleuze de la modulación y los diferentes controladores.
Este texto me recuerda mucho a los debates post humanistas. Cada vez es más difícil identificar qué nos controla como sociedad y aún identificando ciertos patrones (porque son demasiados) todo se reduce a: que cosas "crees" que no estas dejando que te controlen y que cosas realmente te están controlando.
PD: absolutamente todo te controla :)
May 27, 2024
Let's make a list of things Deleuze predicted in this essay—
✅ Bitcoin
✅ Gaming rooms at workplaces
✅ Subscription based streaming services
✅ Your password manager app
✅ The entire life and works of Mark Zuckerberg
✅ Sigma male online courses
✅ PragerU
✅ Everyday shenanigans at the silicon valley
✅ The FBI agent sitting on the other side of your rule34 homepage
✅ r/ManMadeHorrorsBeyondYourCompre
-hension
✅ Ralph Breaks The Internet (2018)
✅ Bitcoin
✅ Gaming rooms at workplaces
✅ Subscription based streaming services
✅ Your password manager app
✅ The entire life and works of Mark Zuckerberg
✅ Sigma male online courses
✅ PragerU
✅ Everyday shenanigans at the silicon valley
✅ The FBI agent sitting on the other side of your rule34 homepage
✅ r/ManMadeHorrorsBeyondYourCompre
-hension
✅ Ralph Breaks The Internet (2018)
Read
May 27, 2024Many young people strangely boast of being “motivated”; they re-request apprenticeships and permanent training. It’s up to them to discover what they’re being made to serve, just as their elders discovered, not without difficulty, the telos of the disciplines. The coils of a serpent are even more complex than the burrows of a molehill.
September 8, 2023
"We are taught that corporations have a soul, which is the most terrifying news in the world."
Essay available at: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/libra...
Essay available at: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/libra...
February 9, 2025
Not actually logging this because it’s literally 7 pages long but OH MY GOD!! I should make a list of shorter texts it would behoove me to re-read every once in a while and this would be near the top. A fantastic articulation of *gestures at everything*
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