44.312 Security Management
 home > unit 1: history of private security and of management

  • What is security?
    • various definitions, no agreement:
      • "freedom from fear or anxiety"
      • "measures taken to guard against espionage, sabotage, crime, attack, or escape."
      • "relatively predictable environment in which individuals or groups of people can pursue their ends without harm or disruption or the fear of injury or disturbances in pursuing their ends"
      • Perhaps most relevant for us: Task Force on Private Security (1976) called "private security" "business enterprises that provide services and products to achieve this protection." Working definition:
        • "Private security includes those self employed individuals and privately funded business entities and organizations providing security-related services to specific clientele for a fee, for the individual or entity that retains or employs them, or for themselves, in order to protect their persons, private property, or interests from various hazards."
        • However, hospitals, universities and other non-profits also have security forces, so Green and Fisher suggest private security be defined as "nonpublic services that provide for the protection of specific individuals or organizations."
  • History of private security
    • Sklansky (1999): growth of private policing natural product of 3 private functions:
      • self-defense
      • free market and economic exchange
      • enjoyment of property
    • appeals to idea that we each should be responsible for part of our own protection
    • communally, having individuals and business unite for mutual aid -- "joint security" -- builds social capital, which tends to reduce crime

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