The post-fordist military: an inquiry into the political economy of private military comparnies

Mark Fulloon, University, My, Tony Van Fossen
2018
The rise and dominance of private military companies (PMCs) have become key factors in a number of conflicts since the end of the Cold War. This thesis is concerned about how the growth of PMCs is related to the changing modes of production from Fordism to post-Fordism. The changes in modes of production to post-Fordism highlights PMCs offering various military services in the current neo-classical economic environment, the outsourcing of military services, the privatisation and changing nature
more » ... of war itself, and how PMCs are regulated in terms of their military operations and business structure. With this in mind, this thesis has researched PMC activity in parts of the world such as Iraq, Sierra Leone, Angola, Colombia, Afghanistan, Somalia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to understand the strategic implications of this phenomenon. Furthermore, the thesis addresses various PMCs within the theatre of war, whether intra-state or inter-state and their roles in other military services not directly related to actual warfare but still have an influential impact and strategic influence on the structure of the armed forces. PMCs such as Executive Outcomes, Sandline International, Military Professional Resources Incorporated (MPRI), Control Risks Group, Cubic Defence, Erinys, Global Risk, DynCorp, Defence Services Limited (DSL), Blackwater USA, or Vinnell Corporation have played key roles in a variety of wars in the Third World from Afghanistan to Sierra Leone and most of the sub-Saharan African continent to Colombia in their drug wars, to the 2003 United States-led Iraq war. As this thesis will show, PMCs are a product of a series of post-Cold War environments in relation to post-Fordism that have led to a new military security paradigm in terms of the state, conflicts, and most defence forces around the globe. The activities of these PMCs have led scholars such as David Isenberg, Peter W. Singer, Deborah Avant, Anna Leander, Carlos Ortiz, Doug Brooks, David Shearer, or William Reno or Rita Abrahamsen to [...]
doi:10.25904/1912/3821 fatcat:hiw5o3jvx5g7dmbilupnbbz5pu