Police, private security, and patitos

Abstract

Police, private security, and patitos the market for security in Mexico City The private security industry is booming across the globe, yet studies of this phenomenon and its relationship to the state in the Global South, and particularly in Latin America, lag behind. Therefore, private policing theories are primarily conceptualised from a Global Northern perspective. In response, this empirically based chapter investigates private policing in Mexico City where the private security industry emerged from the adoption of neoliberal economic policies. Private policing in Mexico City today is a robust but chaotic market where state and non-state actors compete for contracts. The chapter argues that the state fosters a competitive and uneven security market by (1) creating strict and costly regulations that are poorly enforced and thus promote widespread regulations evasion, and (2) inserting itself into the private security market with hybrid state and city police forces designed to provide protective services to public and private clients in exchange for monetary rewards.