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For the past two decades, a considerable number of South Africans have been very active in the markets for force, both locally and globally. South Africa has supplied, and continues to supply, this lucrative market of Private Military/Security Companies (PMSCs) with expert personnel offering military/security and related services. Among other things, this resulted from South Africa's past history, where a considerable number of ex-military/security personnel found themselves without any source of employment immediately after the process of disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR). The only skills they possessed could only be sold in the local and global markets for force. A sizeable number of ex-military/security personnel established private security companies within South Africa. Others actively participated in mercenary activities, a fact which has been notoriously linked to the now defunct Executive Outcomes. South Africans continue to participate in various armed conflicts in Africa and beyond, providing diverse military/security and related services. Resulting from the South Africans involvement in the markets for force, South Africa responded by addressing both the internal and external dimensions of the privatisation of security through legislation. This paper shall consider how the markets for force have impacted on South Africa's monopoly on the use of force. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of Private Military Security Companies (PMSCs) into a multi-billion dollar global business marks a major shift in how conflict and post-conflict interventions are managed. As such, PMSCs have attracted the attention of scholars working wit ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The growing privatization of security and violence and its differing effects on men and women is an under-researched area of security sector reform. This paper will examine what international or regional instruments and laws mandate the integration of gender and human rights issues into the privatization of security. It will further provide the context of gender concerns in post-conflict situations, in developing and developed countries. We argue that mainstreaming gender concerns through targeted initiatives will increase operational effectiveness of private security companies and mitigate the negative impacts of these companies in the absence of regulation. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In trying to grasp the mode of international security as it stands today, operations of Private Military/Security Companies (PMCs/PSCs) and outsourcing of security as such highlight important changes impacting international society. On the one hand, one can observe the privatization of the military of the United States at its height attracting both amazement and suspicion: on the other hand, one sees the private security sector in the United Kingdom shifting towards post-Iraq reconstruction and international development. This paper explores how PSCs seek new relations in international community especially in their relation to the non-profit development sector, while distinguishing themselves from the more belligerent US model. Reference will be made to the British Association of Private Security Companies (BAPSC), peacekeeping training and PMSCs, as well as current developments observed in Japan. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much of the debate on security privatization takes place under the assumption that security privatization is one, largely coherent phenomenon. It is generally believed to have originated in historical developments in the aftermath of the Cold War and freq ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much has been written about the resort to private military companies (PMCs) in the context of the contemporary “counter-insurgency operations” in Afghanistan and Iraq. Simultaneously it is admitted that the phenomenon of privatization of security is broad ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The central contention of this paper is that most individuals in the modern world are simultaneously participants in two anarchical practices. The most well-known of these is the anarchical practice of sovereign states. This practice is anarchical in that states do not acknowledge any sovereign global government with authority over them. Less well acknowledged, is the second global anarchical practice which I call ?global civil society?. This is the society of individual rights holders who recognise one another as autonomous within a global practice of rights holders. While the members of this anarchical society make use of many social institutions to protect their individual human rights ? including states and international organisations -- they do not acknowledge any global sovereign authority over them which has the right to modify their rights. In this paper I address the ethical justifications which might be given in defence of these two forms of anarchy. In particular I want to determine whether these practices, at a very fundamental level, threaten one another. Or, alternatively, are there ways in which they may be harmonised? In order to explore these issues and to make the discussion of them less abstract, I use the example of private military companies as participants in both the anarchical practice of states and the anarchical practice of rights holders. This focus will allow me to address some of the problems encountered when we attempt to construct a coherent whole from these two anarchical practices. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the post-Cold War period, states involved in violent conflict have become increasingly willing to employ the services of private military companies, acting on an international market, to perform military-related functions. This privatisation of violence and security calls into question dominant assumptions about the Westphalian state’s claim to authority and control over violence and its role as provider of protection. In research, this trend towards privatisation has been seen as intimately linked to the logic of the so-called ‘new wars’. However, this paper argues, a more comprehensive analysis can be reached by also acknowledging that the use of non-state actors in violent conflict has clear historical connotations. Thus, this paper will place the theoretical challenges to state-centric modes of analysis in a wider historical perspective and initiate a discussion on how a historically grounded framework for analysis might further our thinking on the impact of privatisation on the role and function of the national state in the post-Cold War period. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the development of neo-liberal governmentality in security. It focuses on the specific processes, mechanisms and practices through which neo-liberal governmentality is becoming increasingly central in the field of security. The argument begins from the understanding that both in the overall field of security and in our respective sub-fields (EU migration control and military service provision) a neo-liberal governmentality is increasingly present and entrenched. The provision of security is being restructured as a set of (quasi-)markets in security services with a strong emphasis on entrepreneurial values of managerialism and economic reasoning. The neo-liberal governmentality in turn feed into and reshape overall security politics as neo-liberal principles are increasingly mobilized to buttress private agentsÂ’ institutional authority as security experts. Exploring the ways in which neo-liberal governmentality feeds into and reshapes overall security governance, we consider the evolving involvement of (1) private security contractors in Darfur and (2) the involvement of private agents in EU immigration control. We argue that in both our cases the neo-liberal governmentality has had strong depoliticizing effects. In making this argument we rely on the Foucauldian notion of governmentality which we give substance using a Bourdieusian framework of analysis. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many of the analyses regarding the expansion of transnational private security firms have coupled calls for greater regulation and accountability with claims that the expansion of private security firms have eroded the state’s monopoly of legitimate violence. Thus, the perceived need for greater regulation of the private security industry transcends pragmatic issues of democratic accountability and oversight by linking regulation with theoretical assumptions of modern statehood. While acknowledging private security’s inherent challenge to ontological assumptions of the modern state, the literature on this emerging subject has not addressed the issue in a direct manner. This paper will attempt to address this problem in three parts. First, it will briefly sketch the link between the contemporary literature on private security regulation and the related theoretical puzzle regarding our understanding of the modern state. Second, it will offer a critique of Realist assumptions regarding the state’s monopoly of violence with specific reference to this ‘monopoly’ as a reification of the modern state. Third, it will offer some tentative suggestions on how to move beyond this conceptual deadlock that only sees private security as part of, or a challenge to, the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]