funny sociology
Zygmunt Bauman (2000) deploys an idea first advanced by Beck, the
‘zombie institution’, to account for modern systems of social control that are
simultaneously dead and alive. A zombie institution is alive in so far as it is
embodied in visible social arrangements, but it is also dead (or dying) in so
far as its authority to guide, shape and predict human choices diminishes
(2000: 6). The emergence of zombie institutions signals ‘the end of the era
of mutual engagement . . . between the supervisors and the supervised’ and
the beginning of what he calls a post-Panopticon history (2000: 11).
‘zombie institution’, to account for modern systems of social control that are
simultaneously dead and alive. A zombie institution is alive in so far as it is
embodied in visible social arrangements, but it is also dead (or dying) in so
far as its authority to guide, shape and predict human choices diminishes
(2000: 6). The emergence of zombie institutions signals ‘the end of the era
of mutual engagement . . . between the supervisors and the supervised’ and
the beginning of what he calls a post-Panopticon history (2000: 11).