Plural Policing and the Challenge of Democratic Accountability

This chapter explores the accountability of the mixed economy of public and private policing in the England and Wales. Its starting point is the recognition that a variety of public, private and hybrid actors are engaged in the authorization and provision of policing. As a consequence, the article does not restrict its analytical gaze to how state power, as deployed by police forces, is made accountable. Rather, it considers how, under market conditions, networks of plural policing can be governed according to, and accommodated within, a set of democratic principles. In so doing, it is argued that ‘local security networks’ comprising state, civil society and market actors, and whose governance and accountability mechanisms frequently stand outside of extant political structures, raise specific challenges if they are to be governed not only effectively but also democratically. The article proceeds to consider options for bringing democratically accountable governance to plural policing networks.