New South Wales

Bentham was a fervent opponent of transporting convicts to New South Wales, and his arguments are best rehearsed in his Panopticon versus New South Wales (1802).

Panopticon versus New South Wales sees Bentham at his angriest, as he believed that the practice of transportation thwarted his panopticon penitentiary scheme. In this work, he denounces transportation, government, colonial society, and compares them all (unfavourably) with the panopticon. It is a rather tendentious work, and should be read with some caution. Though it had no influence on policy in his lifetime, the arguments made in Panopticon versus New South Wales were at the centre of the case made by anti-transportation campaigners during the mid-to-late 1830s.

For some of Bentham's writings on New South Wales, please consult the following boxes of material:

Easy

• Box 97

Moderate

• Box 97
• Box 107
• Box 116
• Box 121
• Box 122

Difficult

• Box 97

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