Hur kan kameraövervakning på allmän plats vara ett hot mot den personliga integriteten?

Abstract

Is video surveillance in public spaces a threat against individual privacy?

The topic of this article is the relationship between the private sphere and the public (social, political) space. The author examines the idea of privacy (personlig integritet) – using public video surveillance in Sweden as the case. In the Swedish discourse – as well as in other national contexts – a conflict is assumed between surveillance and the protection of individual privacy. Integritet – the Swedish word for privacy – is defined in a traditional liberal way as the right to be let alone. The author argues that the protection of privacy (skyddet av integriteten) – under- stood as a negative right – is irrelevant when it comes to surveillance of public spaces. In order to make sense of the concept integritet – which is eligible – its pur- port has to be modified in a direction that makes it socially and politically relevant. Thus, besides conceptual clarification, this article also has a normative ambition.