This article from the Journal of Peacebuilding and Development questions the disproportionate focus in Security Sector Reform on the role of the commercial security sector in West Africa. It argues that the contributions (negative and positive) of other non-state actors need to be considered to facilitate sustainable peacebuilding. The author calls for a comprehensive security agenda to integrate the wide variety of actors operating from different perspectives, and to bridge the gap between the democratic principles of security governance and the practicalities of diverse interests.
Security governance has been reconfigured to advance rapidly growing multi-billion dollar corporate security interests, and ultimately Western financial and political agendas, as part of a global commercialisation trend. Research and policy emphasise this corporate security sector in security governance, neglecting a wide range of other significant non-state actors. The security governance framework therefore needs to be expanded and realigned.
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Corporate security interests are incompatible with the democratic principles of transparency, accountability and inclusion, and ultimately inhibit sustainable peace and development. External assistance may arguably serve external interests by outsourcing security and increasingly peacebuilding functions to contractors, who are unable to provide sustainable, locally driven solutions.
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The neo-colonial origins of statutory security institutions in West Africa makes them vulnerable to external influence, and the state is distanced from local security institutions and process.
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An overview of the activities of non-state security actors in West Africa would include: International non-governmental organisations (INGOs), which facilitate participatory processes for articulating national security policy; foreign private military and security companies, used for support services by many agencies, and as foreign policy tools by supplier governments; local mercenaries, moving between conflicts in the region; criminal networks involved in cross-border organised crime including making and distributing small arms; civil society organisations, which help generate local ownership of security governance processes; domestic private security companies, which contribute little to the provision of security as a public good; non-state armed groups, which increase the proliferation of small arms; and individuals who advocate for effective security governance.
A multitude of non-state actors link security at different territorial levels and regulate relationships within society. The role of security sector governance is to coordinate them and the overall effect of their interaction with each other. Recommendations include:
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giving more prominence to non-state security actors beyond the commercial sector in research and policy-making;
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formulating a comprehensive policy framework to integrate local, external, profit and non-profit actors on one hand, and the state and human dimensions of security on the other. This framework would be responsive to people’s needs rather than focusing on state security. It would recognise the state as the primary provider of security but would also include non-state and non-profit institutions; and
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using long-term approaches to build on local capacity to address the causes of insecurity, rather than relying on contractors to provide ‘quick fixes’ to the challenges of peacebuilding. Foreign contractors hinder the democratic governance of the security sector because they are not locally owned, staffed or managed and do not comply with the basic principles of accountability, transparency and popular participation. They also drain resources from public security institutions and reduce incentives for governments to fulfill their role as security providers. Regulation cannot overcome these inherent deficits.
