How did Discipline and Punish examine power in modern society?

In Discipline and Punish, Michel Foucault employs a genealogical method to examine how power operates in modern society through the lens of power-knowledge (pouvoir-savoir).12

Foucault argues that modern power is not merely repressive but productive, functioning through "disciplines" that aim to render individuals visible, manageable, and productive. He highlights the Panopticon—a prison design by Jeremy Bentham—as the quintessential model for this disciplinary power. By placing inmates under the constant, potential scrutiny of a central watchtower, the structure internalizes discipline, compelling individuals to monitor their own behavior.2

Through this analysis, Foucault exposes how the human sciences, such as criminology and psychology, helped "naturalize" the concept of the "criminal character". Rather than simply punishing the body as in earlier eras, modern institutions manipulate the soul and body to reform the individual, creating "subjects" classified as "normal" or "deviant". Ultimately, Discipline and Punish reveals how these technologies of power and knowledge are inextricably linked, shaping the modern citizenry while cloaking mechanisms of domination in the guise of objective, scientific truth.2