I constantly advocate the privatization of government functions, particularly security and law enforcement. This shooting in Minneapolis is the most recent officer-involved shooting to grace the cover of national news, and it's just another example of the problems inherent in a monopolized security market.
The story follows a similar beat to other senseless police-related shootings. Police responded to a call about a sexual assault, pulled into an alleyway, and were preparing to respond when they heard a loud sound. That's when the victim and the original caller, Justine Ruszczyk, approached the driver's side of their vehicle. The officer in the passenger seat drew his weapon and fired across the vehicle at her, shooting her and killing her.
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com
Let's set aside, for a moment, that a police officer shot someone who'd called 911 since it was likely they didn't know who she was. Two police officers heard a loud sound, saw someone approach their vehicle, and one of them shot them dead. Either he killed her before she said anything, or they engaged in conversation with the woman and he killed her afterward. If the former, why the fuck are they cops if they're going to assume that any loud sound means they're about to fight for their lives? If it's the second, there is no possible excuse for it. I don't have any more details than that, so I can't speak intelligently to it, but either way looks bad.
But beyond that, it's just a symptom of a larger problem: the monopolization of security service by state agencies. The problems with monopolizing any industry are numerous, but particularly in the provision of security does it become a serious problem. Coupled with groups of individuals claiming to be the state, and thus the ultimate arbiters of decision-making in a given jurisdiction, it creates an enormous moral hazard. At that point, not only are these organizations in charge of deciding right or wrong, they can determine whether or not their agents have done right or wrong. This is irrespective of any other outside observer's determination, even if a violation is blatantly obvious and a victim is easily and readily identifiable.
That really sums up the first problem with monopolized security services: there is no one else to go to.
Have an issue with how a police department handles certain cases or certain procedures they follow? Take a number. Have a problem with them enforcing laws you don't agree with? Tough cookies. Prefer to have a private security service? Too bad, the police have jurisdiction over your property whether or not you want them to. In the event they do wrong, or fail to follow procedure, the only arbiter you can appeal to is the same arbiter responsible for establishing the police in the first place. In reality,
cases won against police wrong-doing happen in spite of the criminal justice system, not because of it.
The second problem is the inversion of incentives that happens.
Private firms have a vested interest in providing quality service, which, in the free or mostly-free market, means they will compete with each other to be more effective at preventing crime and securing property. Private security firms that aren't capable of doing so will be overtaken by better firms, or their market share will be divided between more firms. This doesn't happen with police, and it can't. So, rather than police departments losing funding because they're unable to control crime, they receive
more funding. This creates a perverse incentive to report more crime or criminalize victimless activities for the purpose of securing additional funding. Case in point, civil asset forfeiture.
In no reasonable person's mind would simply possessing a large sum of cash be a crime; who's the victim? However, police departments in many states in the US can seize that money from you - many times with the vaguest reasonable suspicion - and the burden falls to you to prove that you had a good reason for having that money. Incentives matter, and they affect police departments the same as people.
Finally, that police departments are shielded from market forces and, to a large extent, liability creates the same problem as any monopoly on force does: it attracts sociopaths and violent people.
Any method of controlling people is going to create incentive for violent and sociopathic people to pursue that method. Creating a whole class of people and a profession whose sole purpose is coercing compliance to statutory laws will inevitably attract sociopaths and aggressive, violent people to it. The same is true for government in general, but with police, the effect is far more direct. Sociopaths spouting gibberish in a marble building somewhere is one thing, but a sociopath with a gun screaming at you to comply or die is a much more direct threat to your person.
This is why the provision of security must be privatized if you, me, or anyone else is going to live more peaceful lives. Private security firms don't have any restrictions on their liability. Private security firms have incentive to prevent crime and create safer environments where they patrol. Private security firms can't arbitrate disputes against them to their own benefit. Private security, for whatever faults it may end up having, is more humane and more accountable by default than the current policing paradigm that exists.
Privatize everything!
Agreed!
Especially privatize the police and investigative services. Remove government to stop private prisons from using fascism to benefit too!
As a private investigator and residential security expert with my own security business, I could not agree more with your post.
I abhor double standards, special protections, and monopolies. We need to create private alternatives to the existing government systems.
Do not fight them. Replace them. Create the alternatives and walk away. Make the existing system obsolete!
Any real world examples where this has worked?
Threat Management Centers (formerly Detroit Threat Management) has had a lot of success, and Dale Brown, the founder, started in an apartment block in one of the worst parts of Detroit with almost zero funding. He built security infrastructure there, where even cops didn't normally respond, and eventually reduced violent crimes and property crimes by an enormous degree. You can check them out at www.threatmanagementcenter.com. I'd strongly recommend taking a look to see how a large, organized security firm might look and how it might operate.
Funnily enough I work in private security and have experience making dangerous situations safer. Like the Young Jeezy concert, on every other stop on his Canadian tour there was serious violent incidents. While at our venue our security team kept everyone safe but we had the police outside. We could have controlled the crowd without the police but only by employing extreme violence. So my problem with this example is that Detroit isn't safe, if you step out of a protected neighbourhood. They have great security firms in South Africa too I'm still not moving there.
I think the point here is: The protected neighborhood is, well...protected. And it's protected by private security.
That's a positive sign that private security is not only possible, but that it can be successful/profitable without any need for coercion. And the private security companies are actually accountable to their customers. If they went around harassing, robbing, beating, and/or killing their customers, they'd probably be out of business in a hurry.
I dunno about you, but I heard that beating and killing your customers is the best way to get repeat business.
And yet, the city police are responsible for the entirety of the city. So who's fault is it that the rest of the city isn't safer?
I also worked in private security, and I was armed. Drove around some absolutely unsafe places to be as a white guy in a uniform at 12:30am, citing cars and calling tow trucks. Did that for a few years, and you wanna know the only time I ever had to draw a baton (never had to draw my firearm)? When some crazy guy in a really ritzy neighborhood by the beach in South Orange County, California got mad at me for towing his car.
What do you mean by extreme violence? Would you have had to start shooting people?
No this is Canada, and doormen aren't allowed to used weapons. More like salutary beating which sounds bad and looks bad but safer than wrestling with someone on concrete. I would lay the blame for the the lack of safety on the specific government involved and a lack of public will to accept the admittedly nasty business of tackling violent criminals.
So then you admit that you could have controlled the crowds without resorting to the ultimate method of conflict resolution that law enforcement can, and does, rely on. My question is: if this is possible to do on a voluntary basis, i.e. where people volunteer for your protection by paying you for it, why does this necessitate the formation and enforcement of a monopoly on the provision of said service? Couldn't an armed security force backing you up provide the same amount of deterrence as a police force?
Yet this has been accomplished, as you've admitted, without reliance on police and instead via private security firms. Recall your protected communities comment. Public will is a reification fallacy; there's no such thing as public will, unless you're referring to the market, in which case, I think by your own admission private security - where it's allowed to operate without state interference - has provided superior results.
I don't deny it could work, and already does work for those who can afford it. I will have to look into your detroit example.
It's not a matter of being affordable though. We don't need revenue collectors and tyrants driving around. Special protections, double standards, and monopolies on force should be fought and resisted.
I would say your Detroit example still has state interference. I would also say my city Vancouver, BC, Canada has a state run police force(municipal) and in my opinion they provide superior results.
Compared to what metric? And how would not being forced to pay for a service you may not want prove superior to allowing market competition to increase quality and decrease cost? Moreover, how do you square the "superior results" of your municipal PD with the inverse incentives and violence attraction of state-operated security services?
They are still funded by theft (taxes). That's nor moral. They also probably enjoy the double standards and special protections I mentioned above. Cops should not be above the law in ANY way.
Either we are equal under the law or not. Which is it?
For example the Vatican. Yes any small state.:)
The Roman Empire is a private security firm?
Private investigation? Private security firms? Executive protection? Alarm companies?
We use to have privatised police forces like the Pinkertons and they fought many battles against strikers, anyone willing stand in the way of the rich and they even performed false flag operations with impunity.
Academi (Blackwater) operates abroad in a very similar fashion to the way the Pinkertons used to operate, by performing military operations and sometimes they even randomly opening fire in the streets to incite the local population to take up arms against the US, so our troops have an enemy to fight.
It is probably not a good idea to bring this type of violence back to the US, by handing total control over the police to the rich, but like a train wreck, it would be interesting to see what would happen.
As far as Pinkertons and strikers go, there was violence on both sides. Strikers damaged plenty of property and continually trespassed on company property back in those days. Moreover, I can provide you with plenty of examples where private security did not do that. Case in point, the security company I worked for contracted with business and residential blocks. The only thing we called the police for was disposition of people who had violated property or persons, since in California, a private security agent can't take that person to the county jail.
Blackwater, insofar as they provide executive security, is an exemplar of high-end security services. However, you can't use their government contracts as some sort of example of possible behavior absent a state, since they are literally functionaries of the state.
I provided physical security and parking enforcement in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Orange County. It's not just for the rich, and if you allow for market competition, security services would be much better quality and much cheaper. Look at alarm companies. There's more than a dozen here in Montgomery county alone.
That's funny because "the rich" control politicians and city councils, and those people control government police agencies. What on Earth do you think we have now? LOL
Economics schools have a nasty habit of promoting privatisation as the solution to every problem. I think article is a prime example of the sort of weird and wacky proposition such a deluded mind set can lead to.
When we subordinate ourselves to the law, as enforced by the state police, we give up key our natural rights. Giving these up to a democratically elected government is a necessary evil. Why on earth would you give them up to a private company? An entity who's main concern when working out the meaning of justice when someone's just stolen your wallet, is how best to maximize profits and cut costs? Why would you sell justice to the highest bidder?
No, it's not. Unless you believe that people must be coerced because they can't be left to their own devices, this falls on its face. And if that is in fact what you believe, why would you trust a small group of these same fallible people to rule over others? Surely you don't prefer being coerced to not being coerced, do you?
I don't understand the assertion you're making at the end. What rights am I giving up to a private company? I can defend myself, right? Why can't I contract that action out to a third party to do it for me? Surely you don't think alarm companies are evil entities that are incapable of operating without trampling on the property rights of their customers, unlike state governments.
Hey, thanks for the reply. I should say, I did find your article interesting to read and so i'll give you a follow. My position is this.
I don't exactly believe people need to be coerced into doing good. I think people need the threat of coercion to stop them from doing bad .
Without any source of coercion to call the shots when people start falling out with each other, they will tend to violence in the long run (though i realise thats no exactly what you're advocating). I don't think everyone is a blood thirsty monster, but there is certainly enough greed, arrogance and stupidity in humanity to undermine the trust we have for the average stranger in a situation without police force... misunderstandings will happen, followed by action, revenge, reaction, and ultimately violence cycles.
So whats the solution? We regulate violence a single force responsible for the monopoly of force - a judiciary and a state police force. The reason i think that police force shouldn't be privatised is that private companies are motivated by profit, we don't want our justice system to be motivated by profit. You're just asking for corruption. At any rate, what happens when two or more armed private police forces disagree about what who the criminals are? Without a central authority and law to refer to how will they decide? Whats to stop them from just declaring each other obstructions to justice and entering all out war?
Also, in reply to your question: "Surely you don't prefer being coerced to not being coerced, do you?" This is a false dichotomy. I'd be under coercion in both cases, either by the democratically elected politicians who control the state police or by private security services (essentially someones henchmen by the sounds of it lol) controlled by people over whom i have 0 control.
How would that be the case? Unless you're trespassing on someone's property, what interaction would you have with private security?
Well the police do a lot more than just protect private property. I would be at the mercy of everyone who could pay for a bigger private security for than me
That's right. They also extort people for victimless, so-called crimes. They violate and damage persons and property, many times without cause or justification.
How would you be at the mercy of a private security company hired to protect the property and persons of those they're under contract with? I think you're misconstruing what private security means.
Well, for starters, war is extremely expensive. It doesn't seem like it is in this day and age because it's happening everywhere, but the only way that it's funded is by massive amounts of borrowing and taxation. To put it into perspective, the only reason the US has kept the dollar from failing is by enforcing a monopoly on what currency is used to buy and sell oil (the petrodollar peg). That's literally the only thing keeping the dollar from going the way of the lira or the ruble in the 1990's. Without a central bank that can offload the debt, engaging in war is a matter of how much you personally are willing to spend on it. Most hired security guards aren't going to care enough or be paid well enough to want to engage in that, and those that do have enough money to pay their agents well enough are likely too busy engaged in productive enterprise absent a state.
You seem to be misunderstanding my position. The paradigm we exist under now needs to be done away with, for many reasons - including the ones I mentioned. Private security doesn't strip anyone of their rights. In the same way a business park hiring private guards to secure their property isn't infringing on anyone's rights, hiring a firm to protect my property doesn't take away anyone's rights. You don't have a right to another person's property or person.
I'm also not sure what you mean by "just asking for corruption." Are you saying that private security companies wouldn't operate according to their contracts with their customers and instigate conflicts on their own behalf?
By corruption i mean that the carrying out of justice wouldnt be neutral, it would be determined by who could pay for the biggest best security force.
What do you suppose happens when two people stake a claim to the ame property? Their respective security services would fight. This is what i mean by war
What happens now when there's competing claims to property? Do individuals bidding on a plot of land or a house try to kill each other off? Do we regularly read reports of police preventing bloodshed over two people trying to buy the same car? No, we don't.
Moreover, you're ignoring all of the problems I mentioned in my article. Justice is not blind or neutral with a state. In point of fact, it can't be, because the state arbitrates disputes to which it is a party.
"Do individuals bidding on a plot of land or a house try to kill each other off?"
No, but we have a police force to ensure that this wouldn't be a profitable course of action - thats the whole point of a state police force. lol so thanks for validating my belief that the currents system works (by and large at least ;)).
One of your key arguments is that you don't like having a monopoly on power. But if we had private security and no state to guarantee our protection, monopolies in the industry would form anyway. This is natural and inherent in the free market. Furthermore, since state regulation of the free market has receded with the rise of neoliberalism in the US and EU over the last 30(ish) years, we've seen MORE monopolists forming. If we
had no state to stop an economic entities from becoming too powerful, democracy would crumble. Plutocracy would take over - as every aspect of our lives, including our own safety in determined by those who can afford to pay.
Monopolies are not natural. There are only two ways that monopolies form in a free market. Either the firm is the first on the scene (first-comer advantage) or they are the only firm in a given area providing a product or service. Monopolies are prohibitively expensive to maintain for any significant period of time - unless you control all the guns or know the guy who does (government). Absent a state, a would-be monopolist would have to continually expend vast sums of resources to buy out competitors or operate at continual losses to try to run them out of business. Regulations on industries are numerous and all over the place, so I'm not sure what state regulations you're talking about. There are tens of thousands of regulations in the US federal ledger alone covering almost every conceivable kind of market transaction, and every year more are added.
I never said the current system doesn't work. It does, and I said as much; the state providing security proves it can be done. It's vastly inferior to a private solution and unethical for the reasons I mentioned, without even mentioning the economic calculation problem.
What happens if i cant afford private security? Am I not allowed justice?
What do you mean by justice? Have you ever lived in an apartment or community? When I worked private security, I contracted with HOAs, apartment complexes, and business parks. The cost of providing security was diffused among those actually using the service.
There are strict limits to what those private security firms in apartments can do. They can't, for example burst into someones private flat without good cause (thank god). Without a monopoly on power, those rights are not guaranteed by anyone. He who controls the security guard's pay check, controls what they're allowed to do. I'd rather it be democratically elected politicians, who can be ousted from power, instead of the richest person on the block
What are you talking about? Liability limits what they can do. I realize things are a little bit different in Canada, but economic pressures exist regardless of where you are. When the security guards and the company are the only ones bearing the cost of bad actions and mistakes, those security companies have to be much more mindful of what they do. To use a different example to illustrate the idea: how discerning are you when you buy a car with your money? When you know that its your money paying for something and you're responsible for all the negative externalities from your decision, are you more discerning about what you choose to do? Or less? How much more frugal are you when your resources are limited?
Again as above, what do you think happens now? Justice is an illusion only the middle class believes in, for the rich and poor know better.