AO: Breckenridge notes that, contrary to widely held belief, it is an effort to escape the limits of the old paper state – of slow, susceptible or unreliable bureaucratic processing, of forgery, deception and translation in the preparation of documents – that lies at the core of the effort to develop biometric identification technologies. (“And this political imperative – to sweep away the slow and messy and unreliable paper-based systems of government – remains a key part of the appeal of these systems.”) (16) He notes that scholars (Wiener, Habermas) would be surprised that this kind of technosurveillance state developed outside of the “developed West” and in some of the poorest countries in the world (16).
AO: Breckenridge notes that whereas identification in almost every other society has emerged from the demands of local government, in South Africa it can be undertaken only by a single, central government agency and only by means of fingerprinting. This biometric centralisation he argues is globally distinctive and has been in place for half a century, and it affects almost every aspect of institutional life in South Africa – from banking to vehicle licensing. (19).
AO: Breckenridge notes that: “Government in Africa, which scholars have variously described as a gatekeeper state, as decentralised despotism and as hegemony on a shoestring, has been defined much more by the absence of information than its presence.” (25)
