If you see something, say something: Lateral surveillance and the uses of responsibility

Abstract

The US Department of Homeland Security's new If You See Something, Say Something campaign displays a renewed drive to redistribute surveillance responsibilities to the public. Using this campaign as its point of departure, this article examines the relationship between conditions of sovereign governance and public lateral surveillance campaigns. As the police and other sovereign institutions have receded from their traditional public responsibilities, many surveillance functions have been assumed by the lay population via neighborhood watch and other community-based programs. Comparing this development with the policing functions of lateral surveillance during the Norman Conquest, this article provides a historically grounded analysis of the potential for this responsibilization to fracture the social by transforming communal bonds into technologies of surveillance power. © The author, 2012.