I think Eva has brought us back around to Althusser by noting that in different epochs different ISAs tend to dominate the discourse. In the middle ages, the religious ISA demonstrated the most power within many societies whereas today education arguably occupies this position (although communication may wield even more power and we cannot divorce CSI from this ISA either).

More importantly though, when a particular ISA is revered by the populace then the RSA may, and often will, attempt to co-opt that ISA to help reinforce or alter its own image. It seems to me that if we can identify where the ISAs and the RSA intersect, then we’ve found a good starting point for a number of discussions–like those we’ve had here today.

I can’t help thinking that we are back in the Middle Ages when the priest delivered from his pulpit the Church’s pre-digested version of the world. The difference is that now scientists are the ones occupying the pulpit and have traded Latin and God for technology and Science. In any case, we are back to having a small group who wields the power to create our everyday reality.

More importantly, the idea that CSI is the cause rather than a cause points to the issues that Kathleen raises regarding the way that science dominates the way we order knowledge. Empirical thinking too often oversimplifies complex questions like the ones that underlie the CSI Effect itself. By saying this I don’t mean to imply that empiricism is without merit, but I would say that the move toward science certainly pre-dates this program and the discussion should not revolve solely around the way that one TV program or genre has changed the way that American society views science.

Good point, Derek. As soon as I hit “post,” I thought, you know, creationists, or even the “global warming doesn’t exist” folks might agree with you here. So clearly I don’t want to throw all empiricism out with the power/knowledge bathwater. But I am always curious about the ways that the empirical comes to dominate our ways of ordering knowledge at the expense of other, more subjective modes of understanding. (Which you might guess, given the ways my comments this week keep coming back to that point!)

It’s also significant that he makes these claims in a church, “God’s house,” as he says, suggesting that physical evidence is also a kind of religious (in this case, Christian/Catholic) Truth, and eliding the difference between himself, the State authorities, and God. These days, I worry a lot more about citations of God (in whatever form) as a kind of seal of Truth, than I do about the truth discourse of scientific knowledge!

The show regularly slips between a CSI’s role as supporting police to becoming investigators themselves. Everything I know about police functionality comes from crime fiction/TV, but I have never seen any other instance of forensic investigators conducting interviews with suspects & witnesses - on this show, it often seems like the detectives are the functionaries that carry out the insights of the CSIs, not the other way around. Since the crime procedural has always asserted authenticity as one of its primary badges of quality, it has seemed odd to me that the role of the CSI is so inflated via the very mechanisms of “truth” and “accuracy” that would seem to be contradicted by actual investigative staffing - or at least how other “authentic” crime dramas present them!

Louis Althusser (1969) tells us that the Repressive State Apparatus (RSA) is comprised of the government, military, police, courts, prisons etc. More importantly, Althusser says that the RSA is a unified public institution that functions via violence or threat of violence. Science, on the other hand, would seem to be part of what Althusser refers to as Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs). ISAs are not unified and may be either public or private institutions that function ideologically rather than violently.

Grissom’s denial tells viewers that the CSIs are non-violent and independent of the RSA. For me, like the citizen in the scene, this consistent denial is a bit of smoke and mirrors; after all, CSIs are issued guns and badges. In effect, this scene illustrates how the RSA can use the dominant discourses associated with certain ISAs, like education, to mask the genesis of its power. In the CSI world, the RSA no longer functions primarily via violence or threat of violence but instead wields its power via knowledge or threat of knowledge.

How might CSI’s depiction reflect or reconstruct viewers’ understandings of the modern American State? Do viewers tend to agree with Grissom’s distinction or are they more like the citizen in the scene?