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ARTICLE · 16 JULY 2002

The Greatest Happiness

AustraliaStrategy
Lionel Docker
Lionel Docker

The new privacy legislation in Australia evidences on the part of legislators a lack of appreciation of the conceptual and symbolic issues involved on a scale equal to the debate concerning the Aboriginal ‘stolen generation’. Ironically, it is possible that online retailers may have a champion in the unlikely person of Professor Allan Fels, Chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

The preserved body of the great English utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) can be seen on the Internet. Mr Bentham’s remains sit in a glass case in the foyer of University College London where a video camera pointed at his etiolated corpse updates images on to the Internet every five minutes for the world to see. Only those who know that Mr Bentham was the inventor of the Panopticon would appreciate the ironic significance of this macabre spectacle.

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