This book examines the debate over private security contractors, using historical and contemporary cases, including several non-Western examples.
Since the end of the Cold War, security privatization has grown in its geographical outreach, breadth, and scope. This pervasive expansion of the private military and security market warrants a systematic investigation of commercial actors’ involvement in the variety of tasks associated with the provision of violence, ranging from combat to vessel protection and cybersecurity. Combining theoretical and empirical approaches, the essays in this volume provide a historical investigation into private force that extends beyond Europe and the United States.
By focusing on recent developments, such as the extensive involvement of Russian mercenaries in Ukraine, new evidence from the Global South, and the added historical depth given to the study of commercial providers of warfare, this volume questions the endurance of norms like the mercenary taboo and the state monopoly of violence. In doing so, it sheds new light on the past, present, and future of private security.
This book will be of much interest to students of private security studies, military studies, security studies, and international relations.
Introduction Part I: Historical Overview 1. Mercenaries and Neomedievalism: From History to Historicity 2. Private Military Corporations and Military Contractors in the Chola Empire: Circa 800-Circa 1200 CE 3. Mercenaries in 14th-Century Europe: Crack troops or ‘useless and dangerous’? 4. How Britain Socially Constructed Mercenaries: The Case of German Soldiers in British Service during the American War of Independence Part II: Private Force Today 5. The Market for Force in the United Arab Emirates’s Network-centric Statecraft 6. Wagner Goes South: Russian Private Military Contractors in North Africa and the Sahel 7. Private Security in Colombia: The stabilisation of Medellin 8. China’s Emerging Private Security Companies: Development, challenges, and future prospects 9. Varieties of Maritime Private Security: Commercial vessel protection off the Horn of Africa and in the Gulf of Guinea 10. Private Military Companies: Low-cost tools for power and status? 11. International Volunteers in the Ukraine War: Macro-level scripts and micro-level motivations 12. Representations of Soldiers of Fortune in Mexico and the Congo in American and European Cinema Part III: Private Force and the Future of International Security 13. Future Warfare between Privatization and Automation 14. Private Warriors for the Digital Age? The demand and supply of cybersecurity firms 15. Private Force in Africa: Reassessing regulatory frameworks and advocating for an African-centric approach to PMSCs Conclusion
Eugenio Cusumano is Professor of Politics at the University of Messina, Italy. He is the author/editor of several books, including Piracy and the Privatisation of Maritime Security (with Stefano Ruzza, 2020) and Mobilization Constraints and Military Privatization (2023). Christopher Kinsey is Professor of International Security at King's College, London. He is the author/editor of several books including Contractors and War (co-edited with Malcolm Patterson, 2012) and The Mercenary (2023). Robert Parr is leading International Security Consultant and a 25-year veteran of UK Special Forces and National Intelligence. He has held a series of executive and senior management appointments within the global security sector, where he has provided consultancies in more than 140 countries worldwide.
