Regulating the Private Security Industry

The under-regulation of the private security industry has increasingly become a topic of media and academic interest. This Adelphi Paper enters the debate by explaining why the industry requires further regulation, and what is wrong with the current system. It begins by briefly defining the industry and explaining the need for more effective regulation, before analysing three types of regulation: domestic, international and informal (including self-regulation).

Sarah Percy is a Research Associate in the Oxford Leverhulme Programme on the Changing Character of War. She taught in King's College London's Defense Studies Department at the Joint Services Staff and Command College where she still lectures on the subject of private force.