SIPRI Policy Paper No. 9

Private Security Companies: The Case for Regulation

Caroline Holmqvist

The private provision of security and military services challenges conventional assumptions about the roles of the nation state as the main protagonist in military affairs and as the guarantor of physical security for its citizens. In the absence of effective legal or regulatory structures, such activities raise issues of legality, legitimacy and accountability in the sphere of security policy. This study assesses the impact of ‘the privatization of security’ in various security contexts and examines some of the ways in which the international community might respond to this development.

1. Introduction

2. Private security in the weak state

3. Private security and the 'efficient' state

4. The global war on terrorism and privatization of security

5. International, regional and national responses

6. Conclusions: the limits of regulation

Caroline Holmqvist (Sweden) is a Research Assistant in the SIPRI Armed Conflict and Conflict Management Programme. She holds degrees in International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and has previously held an internship with the Risk and Security Programme at the Foreign Policy Centre, London. She is a contributor to the chapter on armed conflicts in SIPRI Yearbook 2005: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security (forthcoming 2005). Her research interests include questions of international governance and the dynamics of conflict.

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