[Video Essay] Control City

Control City
Director: Natalie Gusawir
Actor: Zita Ip, Angie Wu

How are we controlled in the street?

Street, a public space. Public space is always associated with freedom. That it is a space where everyone is welcomed and can gather together. However, it does not mean that there are no rules and regulations within the public space. Living in a city that emphasizes freedom and rights a lot, I am wondering if freedom is given to people in public spaces. Therefore, I am looking into different control measures that can be found in the street.

In the video, it first started by showing the physical boundaries of the streets. This is the most easily discovered control in the street which is limiting the area of the streets. There are different ways of creating boundaries such as installation of the banister, creating a level difference with the road, growing of greenery, and most obviously buildings on the sides. These are the limitations people can easily spot when they are walking on the street.

Besides these physical limitations, there are more controls in streets that we may have neglected when we are walking along the street. Surveillance cameras are very common to be found along the street; they do not only facilitate governmental departments in law enforcement or protect the shop owners’ rights and benefits, but they are also observing every movement of pedestrians. I filmed the video in a 60-meter long street. Walking along this street, 8 surveillance cameras are spotted which means there is a surveillance camera per 7.5 meters of distance on average. In the video, I tried to recreate the frame that surveillance cameras capture to understand how people are observed under the surveillance cameras. I invited two actors to walk along the street while I am filming them from a similar angle to the surveillance cameras. Putting all the videos together, it is shocking to know that they can capture every moment of the actors walking along the street. That means that every movement of pedestrians is observed and recorded by the cameras. I end the scene with actors stare at the camera to show the inequality between camera and pedestrian. The camera can see everything on the street, but what pedestrians see is just a tiny object on the corner.

I conducted the research through site visits to understand how physical objects in the street create a boundary. I go to different streets and observe how people access the space. As for the research related to surveillance cameras, I did research online to learn about the number of CCTV installed in HK. While the data online did not include CCTV installed by private owners, I conducted a site visit to count the number of surveillance cameras.

After doing a site visit to learn how the existing control on people in the street, I further studied the impact of that by reading an article about “The Right to Public Space” published by metropolitics(2015). This article emphasizes the importance of public space as a foundation of freedom and rights for people. It is mentioned by the United Nations(2022) that the degree of human rights depends particularly on having public space to exercise them, thus the increasing government effort in exerting control over behavior in public spaces has been a threat to human rights.

Through filming this video, I understand more about the controls in the street where it should be a public space with a high degree of freedom. And it has raised my concern on whether these controlling measures, especially the surveillance cameras are protecting or harming us. On one hand, it is useful in reducing the crime rate and providing security benefits. On the other hand, CCTV is invading privacy which records every movement of people in public spaces. The level of freedom people enjoy in public spaces will be drastically reduced when they are always monitored. This is a serious issue that if the government is having large-scale control over people’s freedom and rights, democracy will slowly disappear. This reminds me of the story 1984, that the Big brother is controlling everyone through the surveillance camera. Will Hong Kong citizens be controlled by another “Big brother” and face dictatorship? This may be a groundless statement now, but if there is no control over the balance of control and freedom, I believe that it will happen in the future when we are all under the control of a big party through the installation of surveillance cameras. Appropriate use of technology may improve our quality of life, but excessive use of that will cause a problem to our society.

Bibliography
Cultural rights and public spaces. OHCHR. (n.d.). Retrieved May 13, 2022, from https://www.ohchr.org/en/special-procedures/sr-cultural-rights/cultural-rights-and-public-spaces
Orwell, G. (n.d.). 1984.
Slotta, D. (2020, November 24). Hong Kong: Public CCTV Surveillance Cameras by Government Department 2019. Statista. Retrieved May 13, 2022, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/1062702/hong-kong-cctv-surveillance-cameras-by-government-department/
Smithsimon, G. (n.d.). The right to public space. Metropolitiques. Retrieved May 13, 2022, from http://www.metropolitiques.eu/The-Right-to-Public-Space.html
Street. street_1 noun – Definition, pictures, pronunciation and usage notes | Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary at OxfordLearnersDictionaries.com. (n.d.). Retrieved May 13, 2022, from https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/street_1
Natalie, GUSAWIR 3035794545

1 thought on “[Video Essay] Control City

  1. Jen Lam says:

    Appreciate your visual and content design. Your visuals have explained your research well without the need for having voice-over. It is indeed a smart choice to have 2 cast walking along the street. Moreover, your text has clearly demonstrated your research and methods. I wonder how you chose your site? Is CCTV surveillance a general situation in most of the streets or only on the street you filmed?

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.