Who Watches Whom? The Curious Case of esDnevnik as an Educational Panopticon in Serbia

11th International Scientific Conference Technics, Informatics and Education – TIE 2026, (pp. 134-140)

 

AUTOR(I) / AUTHOR(S): Andrea Gašić and Milan Stančić

  

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.46793/TIE26.134G

SAŽETAK /ABSTRACT:

This paper explores esDnevnik, the Serbian digital gradebook system, through Michel Foucault’s concept of panopticism. While digital educational technologies are often discussed in terms of efficiency, transparency, and improved communication, we situate esDnevnik within a broader social context. From a Foucauldian perspective, this digital gradebook can be understood as a disciplinary technology that expands visibility and surveillance through the continuous production of data about students and teachers. Two questions guided the analysis: what kinds of students and what kinds of teachers are produced through esDnevnik? The paper argues that the system contributes to the production of students as knowable and governable subjects whose behaviour is shaped through visibility, comparison, and normalization. Teachers also occupy a dual position as both subjects and objects of surveillance, becoming increasingly visible through documentation and performance indicators. The paper further discusses how esDnevnik reshapes power relations by extending disciplinary observation beyond the school and incorporating parents into monitoring processes. We conclude that, although esDnevnik can be interpreted as an educational panopticon, its disciplinary effects are neither complete nor uncontested. Rather than simply producing compliance, the system may also encourage strategic adaptation to its evaluative criteria, leaving open questions about its actual pedagogical consequences.

KLJUČNE REČI / KEYWORDS: 

esDnevnik; digital gradebook; panopticism; educational surveillance; Serbia

 PROJEKAT / ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:

The article is a result of research done at the University of Belgrade – Faculty of Philosophy, financially supported by the Ministry of Science, technological development, and innovations of the Republic of Serbia (451-03-33/2026-03/ 200163).

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