ABSTRACT
Situated across three different regions, Norris and Armstrong identify seven Working Rules that appear to inform the daily activities of the Closed Circuit Television operatives. These rules reveal the significance of class, race, gender and age as important mediators in decision making about what constitutes suspicious behaviour and is therefore worthy of further attention, and what, in contrast, is deemed innocuous and mundane. From the operators’ perspectives, if a person was defined as ‘other’, either their moral propensities were unknown, and therefore worthy of surveillance in case they turned out to be malign, or they were already ‘known’, by reference to stereotypical assumptions contained in media, political and everyday discourses. Surveillance can work as an essential mechanism for protecting individual rights and freedoms. Some level of surveillance and monitoring is a requirement for the smooth and efficient functioning of society.
