Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

Regulating US Private Security Contractors pp 1–22Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

Introduction

  • Chapter
  • First Online:

  • 112 Accesses

Abstract

By demonstrating weaknesses of regulatory outcomes related to regulatory processes of private security contractors, it is argued that it is essential to leave behind commonly accepted wisdom and focus on studying practices in order to have a more comprehensive approach to process and, ultimately, of outcomes. The proposal is to apply Bourdieu’s Theory of Practice for this effect and to study dynamics and stakeholders involved in order to gain comprehensive understanding of how and why certain outcomes emerged. It lays out the how of the argument addressed in the chapters. Finally, it finishes with an explanation of methodological choices.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD   54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

References

  • Abrahamsen, Rita, and Anna Leander. 2016. Routledge Handbook of Private Security Studies. Abingdon, Oxon and New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Abrahamsen, Rita, and Michael C. Williams. 2010. Security Beyond the State: Private Security in International Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Anders, Birthe. 2013. “Tree-Huggers and Baby-Killers: The Relationship Between NGOs and PMSCs and Its Impact on Coordinating Actors in Complex Operations.” Small Wars & Insurgencies 24 (2): 278–94.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Andreopoulos, George, and Shawna Brandle. 2012. “Revisiting the Role of Private Military and Security Companies.” Criminal Justice Ethics 31 (3): 138–57.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Armendariz, Leticia. 2013. Corporate Private Armies in Afghanistan. Regulating Private Military and Security Companies (PMSC) in a “Territorial State.” Barcelona: NOVACT.

    Google Scholar 

  • Avant, Deborah. 2005. The Market for Force: The Consequences of Privatizing Security. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2007. “The Emerging Market for Private Military Services and the Problems of Regulation.” In From Mercenaries to Market: The Rise and Regulation of Private Military Companies, edited by Simon Chesterman and Chia Lehnardt, 179–95. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2016. “Monkey Cage People (Including Me) Used to Think That the Private Military Industry Couldn’t Govern Itself. We Were Wrong.” Washington Post (Blog), April 12. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/04/12/people-including-me-used-to-think-that-the-private-military-industry-couldnt-govern-itself-we-were-wrong/?postshare=211461160758490&tid=ss_fb.

  • Avant, Deborah D. 2016. “Pragmatic Networks and Transnational Governance of Private Military and Security Services.” International Studies Quarterly (February), sqv018.

    Google Scholar 

  • Avant, Deborah, and Renee De Nevers. 2011. “Military Contractors & the American Way of War.” Daedalus 140 (3): 88–99.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Axelrod, Alan. 2014. Mercenaries: A Guide to Private Armies and Private Military Companies. Thousand Oaks, CA: CQ Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bakker, Christine, and Mirko Sossai, eds. 2012. Multilevel Regulation of Military and Security Contractors: The Interplay Between International, European and Domestic Norms. Oxford: Hart Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brayton, Steven. 2002. “Outsourcing War: Mercenaries and the Privatization of Peacekeeping.” Journal of International Affairs-Columbia University 55 (2): 303–32.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brickell, Missye. 2010. “Filling the Criminal Liability Gap for Private Military Contractors Abroad: U.S. v. Slough and the Civilian Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act of 2010.” Legislation and Policy Brief 2 (2): article 3.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, Kimberly N. 2013. “We the People, Constitutional Accountability, and Outsourcing Government.” Indiana Law Journal 88 (4): 1347–403.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bruneau, Thomas. 2011. Patriots for Profit: Contractors and the Military in the US National Security. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Business and Human Rights Resource Centre. 2013. “Case Profile: Abu Ghraib Lawsuits Against CACI, Titan (Now L-3).” http://business-humanrights.org/Categories/Lawlawsuits/Lawsuitsregulatoryaction/LawsuitsSelectedcases/AbuGhraiblawsuitsagainstCACITitannowL-3.

  • Buzatu, Anne-Marie. 2015. “Towards an International Code of Conduct for Private Security Providers: A View from Inside a Multistakeholder Process.” Genève: DCAF.

    Google Scholar 

  • Buzatu, Anne-Marie, and Benjamin S. Buckland. 2010. Private Military & Security Companies: Future Challenges in Security Governance. Geneva: DCAF.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carmola, Kateri. 2014. “Private Military and Security Companies: Armed, Global, Regulated and Professional?” In The Handbook of Security, edited by Martin Gill, 747–66. Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Carney, Heather. 2005. “Prosecuting the Lawless: Human Rights Abuses and Private Military Firms.” The George Washington Law Review 74: 317.

    Google Scholar 

  • Center for Constitutional Rights. 2015. Accountability for Abu Ghraib Torture by Private Military Contractors. New York: Center for Constitutional Rights. http://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/files/assets/files/PMC%20factsheet%20january%202015.pdf.

  • Chakrabarti, Shantanu. 2009. Privatisation of Security in the Post-Cold War Period. IDSA Monograph Series 2. New Delhi: Institute for Defence Studies and Analysis.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chapman, Katherin J. 2010. “The Untouchables: Private Military Contractors’ Criminal Accountability Under the UCM J.” Vanderbilt Law Review 63 (4): 1047–80.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chesterman, Simon, and Chia Lehnardt. 2009. From Mercenaries to Market: The Rise and Regulation of Private Military Companies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Clapham, Andrew, and Valentin Zellweger. 2013. The Regulation of Private Military and Security Contractors. Washington, DC: American Society of International Law.

    Google Scholar 

  • Collier, David. 2011. “Understanding Process Tracing.” PS: Political Science and Politics 44 (4): 823–30.

    Google Scholar 

  • De Nevers, Renee. 2009a. “Private Security Companies and the Laws of War.” Security Dialogue 40 (2): 169–90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2009b. “(Self) Regulating War?: Voluntary Regulation and the Private Security Industry.” Security Studies 18 (3): 479–516.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2010. “The Effectiveness of Self-Regulation by the Private Military and Security Industry.” Journal of Public Policy 30 (2): 219–40.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • DeWinter-Schmitt, Rebecca. 2016. “Transnational Business Governance Through Standards and Code of Conduct.” In Routledge Handbook of Private Security Studies, edited by Rita Abrahamsen and Anna Leander, 258–67. London and New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2017. “The Value-Add of the ICoCA: A ‘Strong Sword.’” Human Analytics (Blog), November 13. http://human-analytics.net/the-value-add-of-the-icoca-a-strong-sword/.

  • Dickinson, Laura. 2005. “Government for Hire: Privatizing Foreign Affairs and the Problem of Accountability Under International Law.” University of Connecticut School of Law Articles and Working Papers, October. http://lsr.nellco.org/uconn_wps/53.

  • ———.2011a. “Privatization and Accountability.” Annual Review of Law and Social Science 7: 101–120.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2011b. Outsourcing War and Peace: Preserving Public Values in a World of Privatized Foreign Affairs, 1st ed. London and New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013. “Regulating the Privatized Security Industry: The Promise of Public/Private Governance.” Emory Law Journal 63 (2): 417–54.

    Google Scholar 

  • Drutschmann, Sebastian. 2007. “Informal Regulation: An Economic Perspective on the Private Security Industry.” In Private Military and Security Companies, edited by Thomas Jäger and Gerhard Kümmel, 443–55. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Dupont, Benoit. 2014. “Private Security Regimes: Conceptualizing the Forces That Shape the Private Delivery of Security.” Theoretical Criminology 18 (3): 263–81.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eichler, Maya. 2014. “Citizenship and the Contracting Out of Military Work: From National Conscription to Globalized Recruitment.” Citizenship Studies 18 (6–7): 600–614.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Erbel, Mark. 2016. “The Politics of Outsourcing Military Support Services.” In The Routledge Research Companion to Security Outsourcing, edited by Joakim Berndtsson and Christopher Kinsey, 231–40. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gaston, E. L. 2008. “Mercenarism 2.0—The Rise of the Modern Private Security Industry and Its Implications for International Humanitarian Law Enforcement.” Harvard International Law Journal 49: 221.

    Google Scholar 

  • George, Alexander L., and Andrew Bennett. 2005. Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences. Cambridge and London: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gomez del Prado, José. 2011. “A United Nations Instrument to Regulate and Monitor Private Military and Security Contractors.” Notre Dame Journal of International, Comparative, & Human Rights Law: 1–79.

    Google Scholar 

  • Guzzini, Stefano, ed. 2012. The Return of Geopolitics in Europe?: Social Mechanisms and Foreign Policy Identity Crises. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hedahl, Marcus. 2012. “Unaccountable: The Current State of Private Military and Security Companies.” Criminal Justice Ethics 31 (3): 175–92.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Herbst, Jefferey. 1997. “The Regulation of Private Security Forces.” In The Privatisation of Security in Africa, edited by Greg Mills and John Stremlau. Pretoria: South African Institute of International Affairs.

    Google Scholar 

  • Horton, Scott. 2015. Lords of Secrecy: The National Security Elite and America’s Stealth Warfare. New York: Nation Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Human Rights First. 2008. Private Security Contractors at War: Ending the Culture of Impunity. New York: Human Rights First. http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/2008/01/16/Department-of-Justice-Continues-to-Ignore-Violent-Crimes-Committed-By-Private-Security-Contractors-in-Iraq-Afghanistan.

  • Hurst, Stephanie. 2011. “‘Trade in Force’: The Need for Effective Regulation of Private Military and Security Companies.” Southern California Review 84: 447–86.

    Google Scholar 

  • Joachim, Jutta, and Andrea Schneiker. 2012. “Of ‘True Professionals’ and ‘Ethical Hero Warriors’: A Gender-Discourse Analysis of Private Military and Security Companies.” Security Dialogue 43 (6): 495–512.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2015. “NGOs and the Price of Governance: The Trade-Offs Between Regulating and Criticizing Private Military and Security Companies.” Critical Military Studies 1 (3): 185–201.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kelly, Rachel M. 2014. “Ensuring Contractor Accountability Overseas: A Civilian Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act Would Be Preferable to Expansion of the False Claims Act.” William & Mary Business Law Review 5: 591.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kinsey, Christopher. 2005. “Challenging International Law: A Dilemma of Private Security Companies.” Conflict, Security & Development 5 (3): 269–93.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2008. “International Law and the Control of Mercenaries and Private Military Companies.” Cultures & Conflicts, English Documents. http://conflits.revues.org/index11502.html.

  • Kinsey, Christopher, and Malcolm Patterson. 2012. Contractors and War: The Transformation of United States’ Expeditionary Operations. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kovach, Christopher M. 2010. “Cowboys in the Middle East: Private Security Companies and the Imperfect Reach of the United States Criminal Justice System.” Connections: The Quarterly Journal 9 (2): 17–35.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krahmann, Elke. 2005a. New Threats and New Actors in International Security. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2005b. “Private Military Services in the UK and Germany: Between Partnership and Regulation1.” European Security 14 (2): 277–95.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2005c. “Security Governance and the Private Military Industry in Europe and North America.” Conflict, Security & Development 5 (2): 247–68.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2010a. Private Security and Military Actors. Edited by Robert A. Denemark. Blackwell Reference Online. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2010b. States, Citizens and the Privatisation of Security. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013. “The United States, PMSCs and the State Monopoly on Violence: Leading the Way towards Norm Change.” Security Dialogue 44 (1): 53–71.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2016a. “Regulation Through Procurement Policies.” In The Routledge Handbook of Private Security Studies, 248–57. Abingdon, Oxon and New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2016b. “Pathologies of Private Security in International Peace Operations: The Case of ISAF.” In ISA Annual Conference, Atlanta.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lanigan, Kevin. 2008. “Legal Regulation of PMSCs in the United States: The Gap between Law and Practice.” privatesecurityregulation.net. http://www.privatesecurityregulation.net/files/Microsoft%20Word%20-%20PMSC%20Article,%20US,%20Kevin%20Lanigan,%20Final.pdf.

  • Leander, Anna. 2007a. “Portraits in Practice: The Private Security Business and the Reconfiguration of International Politics.” In Conference Paper, 6th Pan-European Conference of the SGIR, 12–15, Torino, Italy.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2007b. “The Impunity of Private Authority.” Working Paper No. 89. Chicago. http://openarchive.cbs.dk/handle/10398/6985.

  • ———. 2007c. “Regulating the Role of Private Military Companies in Shaping Security and Politics.” In From Mercenaries to Market: The Rise and Regulation of Private Military Companies, edited by S. Chesterman and Chia Lehnardt. Oxford, UK and New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2010a. “Commercial Security Practices.” In The Routledge Handbook of New Security Studies, 208.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2010b. “Practices Providing Order: The Private Military/Security Business and Global (in) Security Governance.” In The Role of Business in Global Governance: Corporations as Norm-Entrepreneurs, edited by Klaus Dieter Wolf, Annegret Flohr, and Lothar Rieth, 57–77. New York and London: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2010c. “The Paradoxical Impunity of Private Military Companies: Authority and the Limits to Legal Accountability.” Security Dialogue 41 (5): 467–90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2011a. “Risk and the Fabrication of Apolitical, Unaccountable Military Markets: The Case of the CIA ‘Killing Program.’” Review of International Studies 37 (5): 2253–68.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2011b. “The Promises, Problems, and Potentials of a Bourdieu-Inspired Staging of International Relations.” International Political Sociology 5 (3): 294–313.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2012. “What Do Codes of Conduct Do? Hybrid Constitutionalization and Militarization in Military Markets.” Global Constitutionalism 1 (1): 91–119.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013a. “Targeted Killings and Extrajudicial Executions: Technological Agency in the Politics of Legal Expertise.” Leiden Journal of International Law 26 (4): 811–31.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013b. “Technological Agency in the Co-Constitution of Legal Expertise and the US Drone Program.” Leiden Journal of International Law 26 (4): 811–31.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2015. “Ethnographic Contributions to Method Development: ‘Strong Objectivity’ in Security Studies.” International Studies Perspectives (December), ekv021.

    Google Scholar 

  • Loader, Ian, and Adam White. 2017. “How Can We Better Align Private Security with the Public Interest? Towards a Civilizing Model of Regulation.” Regulation & Governance 11 (2): 166–84.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lopez, Carlos. 2017. “Private Military and Security Companies and Human Rights.” In Public International Law and Human Rights Violations by Private Military and Security Companies, edited by Helena Torroja, 83–103. Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Machairas, Dimitros. 2014. “The Ethical Implications of the Use of Private Military Force: Regulatable or Irreconcilable?” Journal of Military Ethics 13 (1): 46–69.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • MacLeod, Sorcha. 2015. “Private Security Companies and Shared Responsibility: The Turn to Multistakeholder Standard-Setting and Monitoring Through Self-Regulation-‘Plus.’” Netherlands International Law Review 62 (1): 119–40.

    Google Scholar 

  • McFate, Sean. 2015. The Modern Mercenary: Private Armies and What They Mean for World Order. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • McKinnon, DonnaMarie. 2011. “Federal Civilian Criminal Prosecutions of Private Military Contractors: Inherent Legal Ethics Issues.” Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics 24: 695.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mehra, Amol. 2010. “Bridging Accountability Gaps—The Proliferation of Private Military and Security Companies and Ensuring Accountability for Human Rights Violations.” Global Business & Development Law Journal 22: 323–32.

    Google Scholar 

  • Østensen, Åse Gilje. 2013. “In the Business of Peace: The Political Influence of Private Military and Security Companies on UN Peacekeeping.” International Peacekeeping 20 (1): 33–47.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pattison, James. 2014. The Morality of Private War: The Challenge of Private Military and Security Companies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Percy, Sarah. 2006a. “International Regulation.” The Adelphi Papers 46 (384): 41–52.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2006b. “Domestic Regulation.” The Adelphi Papers 46 (384): 25–40.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2007. “Mercenaries: Strong Norm, Weak Law.” International Organization 61 (2): 367–97.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013. Regulating the Private Security Industry. London: International Institute for Strategic Studies.

    Google Scholar 

  • Perez, Celestino. 2012. “The Soldier as Lethal Warrior and Cooperative Political Agent: On the Soldier’s Ethical and Political Obligations Toward the Indigenous Other.” Armed Forces & Society 38 (2): 177–204.

    Google Scholar 

  • Petersohn, Ulrich. 2014. “Reframing the Anti-Mercenary Norm: Private Military and Security Companies and Mercenarism.” International Journal: Canada’s Journal of Global Policy Analysis 69 (4): 475–93.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ralby, Ian. 2015. “Accountability for Armed Contractors.” Fletcher Security Review 2: 15.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schaub, Gary, and Ryan Kelty. 2016. Private Military and Security Contractors: Controlling the Corporate Warrior. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • Scheffer, David. 2009. “Closing the Impunity Gap in U.S. Law.” Northwestern Journal of International Human Rights 8 (1): 30.

    Google Scholar 

  • Scheimer, Michael. 2008. “Separating Private Military Companies from Illegal Mercenaries in International Law: Proposing an International Convention for Legitimate Military and Security Support That Reflects Customary International Law.” American University International Law Review 24: 609.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schooner, Steven L. 2005. “Contractor Atrocities at Abu Ghraib: Compromised Accountability in a Streamlined, Outsourced Government.” Stanford Law & Policy Review 16: 549–572.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schwartz, Moche. 2010. The Department of Defense’s Use of Private Security Contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan: Background, Analysis, and Options for Congress. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Services.

    Google Scholar 

  • Singer, Peter W. 2003a. “War, Profits, and the Vacuum of Law: Privatized Military Firms and International Law.” Columbia Journal of Transnational Law 42: 521.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2003b. Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry. New York: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Smith, Thomas. 2008. “Protecting Civilians…or Soldiers? Humanitarian Law and the Economy of Risk in Iraq.” International Studies Perspectives 9: 144–164.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Snell, Angela. 2011. “The Absence of Justice: Private Military Contractors, Sexual Assault, and the US Government’s Policy of Indifference.” University of Illinois Law Review 3: 1125–1164.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spearin, Christopher. 2010. “What Montreux Means: Canada and the New Regulation of the International Private Military and Security Industry.” Canadian Foreign Policy Journal 16 (1): 1–15.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stanger, Allison. 2011. One Nation Under Contract: The Outsourcing of American Power and the Future of Foreign Policy. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tansey, Oisín. 2007. “Process Tracing and Elite Interviewing: A Case for Non-Probability Sampling.” PS: Political Science & Politics 40 (4): 765–72.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, Trevor. 2011. “Private Security Companies in Iraq and Beyond.” International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs 1944–) 87 (2): 445–56.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thumala, Angélica, Benjamin Goold, and Ian Loader. 2011. “A Tainted Trade? Moral Ambivalence and Legitimation Work in the Private Security Industry.” The British Journal of Sociology 62 (2): 283–303.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tiefer, Charles. 2009. “No More Nisour Squares: Legal Control of Private Security Contractors in Iraq and After.” Oregon Law Review 88 (3): 745–75.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tonkin, Hannah. 2013. State Control over Private Military and Security Companies in Armed Conflict. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Whyte, Dave. 2003. “Lethal Regulation: State-Corporate Crime and the United Kingdom’s Government’s New Mercaneries.” Journal of Law and Society 30 (4): 575–600.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of History and International Relations, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Jovana Jezdimirovic Ranito

Authors
  1. Jovana Jezdimirovic Ranito
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Jezdimirovic Ranito, J. (2019). Introduction. In: Regulating US Private Security Contractors. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11241-7_1

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation