Private Military Contractors and International Law: an Introduction
| DOI | 10.1093/ejil/chn071 |
| Pages | 961-964 |
| Date | 01 November 2008 |
| Year | 2008 |
| Published By | Oxford University Press |
The European Journal of International Law Vol. 19 no. 5 © EJIL 2008; all rights reserved
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EJIL (2008), Vol. 19 No. 5 , 961 – 964 doi: 10.1093/ejil/chn071
Private Military Contractors
and International Law: An
Introduction
Francesco Francioni *
A recent survey of young Europeans ’ opinions of national institutions has revealed,
quite surprisingly, that armed forces enjoy the highest level of trust and prestige in
a number of major European countries, well above parliaments, the judiciary, the
church, political parties and business enterprises.
1 The profound motivations underly-
ing this assessment remain unknown – one can only conjecture that they are related
to the increasing sense of insecurity among young generations and perhaps with the
politics of fear – fear of terrorism, of immigrants, environmental disasters, of fi nancial
doom, and of the unknown – that have become widespread at the beginning of the
21st century. What is clear, however, is that in the perception of young generations,
the armed forces still embody the core function of the state as guarantor of the security
of citizens within the national territory.
In contrast with this opinion, the trend in recent years has been progressively to pri-
vatize important sectors of governmental functions through the outsourcing of security
and military services to private actors. Private military and security companies or ‘ con-
tractors ’ thus replace soldiers and members of the armed forces in a variety of situations
that include armed confl ict, prolonged military occupation, peacekeeping, and territo-
rial administration in post-confl ict institutional building and intelligence gathering.
This phenomenon, of course, has not led to the total privatization of armed forces.
It remains rather limited in scope as compared to the operations of national militaries
around the globe. Nevertheless, it has intensifi ed with the wars that have inaugurated
the 21st century – Afghanistan and Iraq, led by the United States in particular – and
it is being further fed by the increased activism of the European Union in international
administration of critical territorial situations and peacekeeping operations, from
* Member of the EJIL Board of Editors and General Co-ordinator of the ‘ Regulating Privatisation of War:
The Role of the EU in Assuring Compliance with International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights ’
project, which is supported within the 7th Framework Research Programme by the European Commis-
sion DG Research ( www.priv-war.eu ).
1 Research commissioned by the British Council to Publica ReS, SwG group, Trieste, ‘ Identity in Transi-
tion ’ , 28 September 2008, see www.publicares.it .
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