|
Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Updated Edition (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs) | 
 enlarge | Author: P. W. Singer
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $19.95
Buy New: $13.57
You Save: $6.38 (32%)
New (28) Used (10) from $9.95
Rating:  20 reviews
Sales Rank: 56742
Media: Paperback
Edition: Updated
Pages: 360
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.9
ISBN: 0801474361
Dewey Decimal Number: 327
EAN: 9780801474361
ASIN: 0801474361
Publication Date: November 29, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
| |
| Also Available In:
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Some have claimed that "War is too important to be left to the generals," but P. W. Singer asks "What about the business executives?" Breaking out of the guns-for-hire mold of traditional mercenaries, corporations now sell skills and services that until recently only state militaries possessed. Their products range from trained commando teams to strategic advice from generals. This new "Privatized Military Industry" encompasses hundreds of companies, thousands of employees, and billions of dollars in revenue. Whether as proxies or suppliers, such firms have participated in wars in Africa, Asia, the Balkans, and Latin America. More recently, they have become a key element in U.S. military operations. Private corporations working for profit now sway the course of national and international conflict, but the consequences have been little explored. In this book, Singer provides the first account of the military services industry and its broader implications. Corporate Warriors includes a description of how the business works, as well as portraits of each of the basic types of companies: military providers that offer troops for tactical operations; military consultants that supply expert advice and training; and military support companies that sell logistics, intelligence, and engineering. In an updated edition of P. W. Singer's classic account of the military services industry and its broader implications, the author describes the continuing importance of that industry in the Iraq War. This conflict has amply borne out Singer's argument that the privatization of warfare allows startling new capabilities and efficiencies in the ways that war is carried out. At the same time, however, Singer finds that the introduction of the profit motive onto the battlefield raises troubling questions--for democracy, for ethics, for management, for human rights, and for national security.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 15 more reviews...
 Brilliant foundation, commands further studies May 31, 2005
Vincent Poirier (Tokyo, Japan)
31 out of 31 found this review helpful
Throughout history, private interests have performed military duties and always proved a critical political factor. Celts and Germans worked in the Roman Emperor's personal Praetorian Guard, King Edward I employed professional companies of archers, and the Swiss fought all over Europe, and are still guarding the Vatican. It's only in the 19th and 20th centuries that the state has become the sole legitimate agent in the conduct of military operations. The 1990s, however, have witnessed the emergence of private organized interests at every level of military operations. The twist comes because today these private military firms (PMFs) are organized as twenty first century corporations, with business plans and long term profit objectives.
Singer's analysis begins with an account of private military interests in ancient and modern times. This gets us used to the idea that PMFs have been around before and are really nothing new. In the second section, Singer classifies PMFs in three segments, each characterized by how far its activities are from actual fighting. First and most obvious there are the military provider firms that place frontline military units (e.g. Executive Outcomes) second there are the consulting firms who train and shape a client's military (e.g. Military Professional Resources Inc.) and third there are the firms that provide logistical and support services such as food delivery (e.g. Brown and Root).
Lastly, Singer examines the implications of using PMFs, which of course being corporations are motivated by profit. Singer illustrates how seemingly simple precepts result in fiendishly complex moral problems.
Do we feel uneasy at for-profit military firms? Of course we do and so we are tempted to dismiss any question of using them. But In 1994, one of the more unsavory firms, Executive Outcomes, created a plan that for some 150 million dollars could have stopped the Rwandan genocide and saved hundreds of thousands of lives.(*) The UN Security Council balked at the costs, nothing was done until the genocide was well under way and half a million people were butchered.
Do we support relief organizations such as CARE? Do we give them money? I do. But how should we feel about the Red Cross and CARE using that money to hire PMFs as protection? Is it right for them to support PMFs? Is it right of us to expect them to go into dangerous situation with inadequate UN or local military protection?
Singer's conclusions are only tentative, and given the emphasis he's placed on how complex the moral dilemma is, this is only proper. He neither condemns nor supports the rise of PMFs, he merely states that they exist and are on the rise, he describes how they operate, and he points out the practical and moral dilemmas that arise from making use of them. He ends with a rewording of the proverb that war is too important to be left to generals: war is too important to be left to private industry. In other words, he warns us that while PMFs are here to stay we must keep them in check and on a leash.
Vincent Poirier, Tokyo
(*) See comments for more on this.
VP
essential for our times June 22, 2003
W. Clifton Holmes (Washington, DC)
21 out of 21 found this review helpful
Singer's categorizations of military assistance organizations confer clarity in a fragmented, heterogenous field of activity. When one thinks of quintessential 'government-provided' services, one thinks of education, prisons, policing, and the military. While privatization in the first three such areas has been studied extensively, Singer has provided here an essential overview and analysis of how privatization has unfolded, to a much greater extent than we may realize, in the military sphere. 5 stars- as readable as it is insightful.
An great look inside the modern private military companies February 17, 2006
A. Sandoc (San Pablo, California United States)
19 out of 20 found this review helpful
P.W. Singer has written a very insightful and detailed look into the modernization and globalization of the private military firms. The private military firm is not a new concept but actually dates back thousands of years. These firms are better known under the more controversial name: mercenaries.
It'd be unfair to say that all private military firms are like the mercenary companies of old. Sure there are still flight-by-night firms that hire themselves out to the highest bidder, switching allegiances on a dime, and committing acts of brutality that made them so infamous during the African civil war and wars of liberation in the late 1950's and through most of the 1960's. The modern private military firm as described by Singer has more in common with corporations that deal in outsourcing specific jobs.
Corporate Warriors goes through in describing the many different types of firms. From the provider firms like Executive Outcomes (a famous early 90's firm created by former South African military operatives) which take a fron-line role in training, advising and fighting for their clients. Then there's firms like the US-based MPR who provide military assistance in the form of advisors that range from ex-generals to former veteren noncoms. The third type would be firms like Halliburton who provide non-combat services (mess hall, laundry, logistics, etc...) for the US Military and its allies.
What all these types of private military firms have in common is in the way they are run. These firms are run like Fortune 500 firms and alot of the companies in the Fortune 500 make use of these firms' services. Whether for help in negotiating with the governments of third world nations to security detail for corporate officers. These firms in the last decade or so have seen a rise in their profits as the US government and its military services have begun outsourcing noncombat duties to outside firms. It is this new practice begun by the US and mirrored by its allies that Singer points should be a concern.
Such firms are not bound by the rules of war and engagement. They also don't fall under the rules of the Geneva Convention in terms of prisoner status in the event employees of such firms become so. With the proliferation of PMF operatives and advisors in combat zones around the world it's inevitable that such employees will become front-line participants in such conflicts instead of staying out in the sidelines. One prime example of such an occurence was the ambush and killing of four Blackwater security operatives in Iraq. In fact, employees of these PMF's account for a very lrage percentage of civilian contractors killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Another example where the line between military and civilian has blurred has been the use of civilian contractors to advise and conduct interrogations not just in Abu Ghraib, Iraq but also in Guantanamo Bay. Such a blurring of the lines has led to corruption and criminal acts.
Singer points this out in detail and sees the trend of governments using civilian contractors to supplement their military more and more in the years to come as a dangerous shift in miitary policy. Singer doesn't just point out the negative consequences of overuse of the PMF's. He also acknowledges that such firms does provide great service to their clients and have become an integral part of the global economy. Singer knows that like any industry the private military firms are here to stay, but with more governmental accountability and oversight of these firms then their negative impact on the political and strategic arena can be minimized.
I highly recommend this book as it takes a centrist approach in dealing with the subject of private military firms and the issues their sudden rise as a power industry has brought to the forefront.
a fascinating look at the dark underbelly of the military June 11, 2003
Joshua A Steinitz (San Francisco, CA USA)
18 out of 20 found this review helpful
Singer is renowned as an expert in the privatization of the military, and has appeared regularly on major news programs like CNN, CNBC, and Nightline. He documents how private companies have taken on an increasingly large role in military operations and support, both on the battlefield and in logistical and support roles, and his study raises serious questions about the conflicts of interest that may occur when military operations become enmeshed in politics and profit motives.
Contemporary Warfare, Expanding Markets August 25, 2003
Jim Albert (New York, NY)
17 out of 17 found this review helpful
Corporate Warriors is an exceptionally well written, well sourced book that will forever alter the way you view the present and future of American foriegn policy and of contemporary war on a global scale. It is a very balanced assesment of the privitization of war, which both exposes some very frightening aspects of the deal-making surrounding it's major players, yet demystifies other components and makes the case for a responsible, accountable use of these corporations. The lingering questions that one is left with at the end of its reading resonate with essential issues concerning globalized capitalism, namely its insatiable demand for the expansion and reinvention of its markets. Here, violence becomes a commodity and market economics come head to head with the social contract and moral conflicts unimagined just a few decades past.
|
|
|
|
| |
