US national security privatization
Encyclopedia
In October 2004, a conference was held at Middlebury College
Middlebury College
Middlebury College is a private liberal arts college located in Middlebury, Vermont, USA. Founded in 1800, it is one of the oldest liberal arts colleges in the United States. Drawing 2,400 undergraduates from all 50 United States and over 70 countries, Middlebury offers 44 majors in the arts,...

, entitled "The Privatization
Privatization
Privatization is the incidence or process of transferring ownership of a business, enterprise, agency or public service from the public sector to the private sector or to private non-profit organizations...

 of National Security." Sponsored in part by the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
The Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs is a professional public policy school at Princeton University. The school has granted undergraduate A.B. degrees since 1930 and graduate degrees since 1948...

 at Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....

, the conference discussed the privatization of functions historically considered the sole province of the military and intelligence agencies of the United States government. One participant, Peter Feaver, said that: "In fact what we’re seeing is a return to neo-feudalism. If you think about how the India Company played a role in the rise of the British Empire, there are similar parallels to the rise of the American quasi-empire" http://www.wws.princeton.edu/ppns/conferences/reports/privtranscript.pdf (pdf)http://archive.epinet.org/real_media/010111/materials/markusen-doc.pdf#search='national%20security%20and%20privatization'.

The conference discussed the "outsourcing
Outsourcing
Outsourcing is the process of contracting a business function to someone else.-Overview:The term outsourcing is used inconsistently but usually involves the contracting out of a business function - commonly one previously performed in-house - to an external provider...

" of some services within the U.S. intelligence
Intelligence
Intelligence has been defined in different ways, including the abilities for abstract thought, understanding, communication, reasoning, learning, planning, emotional intelligence and problem solving....

 and military
Military
A military is an organization authorized by its greater society to use lethal force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or perceived threats. The military may have additional functions of use to its greater society, such as advancing a political agenda e.g...

 sectors. This involves the transfer to the private sector of services previously provided or managed by government (for example, to a private detective agency), a practice that, in the U.S., is simply called "privatization."

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