The Surveillance Studies Reader

From the horrific images of James Bulger's abduction at the Strand Shopping Centre in Bootle, through to the frighteningly mundane pictures of the July 7th bombers at Luton Station, surveillance is a key part of our everyday lives.

In this topical reader Sean Hier and Josh Greenberg bring together extracts from some of the most influential readings on surveillance studies. The reader examines thoughts about self-surveillance, scrutiny of specific parts of society, sophisticated data gathering techniques and the ubiquity of CCTV. While surveillance is an intrinsic feature of human social relationships, it is only in the past few years that information and data-gathering techniques have emerged as a sustained multi-disciplinary topic of investigation and theorization.

Surveillance studies, now a rapidly growing area of academic study, has begun documenting the changing character and consequences of surveillance techniques throughout the world. The readings presented in this book represent one more step towards developing a coherent statement on surveillance studies.

The readings are organised into distinct sections:

• Surveillance, the nation-state and social control
• Computers, simulations and assemblages
• Surveillance in everyday life
• Surveillance, politics and social inequality
• Surveillance and public opinion
• Ethics, privacy and resistance

The Surveillance Studies Reader is key reading for students of sociology, politics, social policy, media and communications studies, social psychology and criminology.

Essays by: Charles Barker, Colin Bennett, William Bogard, Roy Coleman, Christopher Dandeker, Richard Eriscson, Michel Foucault, Oscar H. Gandy, Anthony Giddens, John Gilliom, Stephen Graham, Kevin Haggerty, Susan Hansen, Sean P. Hier, David Lyon, Gary Marx, Dawn Moore, Mike Nellis, Charles Raab, Alasdair Roberts, James Rule, Graham Sewell, Mimi Sheller, John Torpey, John Urry, Kevin Walby, David Wood.

Sean Hier is Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. He is the editor of Contemporary Social Thought: Themes and Theories (2005) and Race and Racism in 21st Century Canada (2007), and Identity and Belonging: Rethinking Race and Ethnicity in Canadian Society (2006).

Josh Greenberg is Assistant Professor in the School of Journalism and Communication, Carleton University, Canada.