ABSTRACT
Chapter 6 explores existing and emerging international regulatory tools and mechanisms that address PMCs as corporations. It further evaluates the effectiveness of industry self-regulation, contemplating the narrative it creates for the legitimacy of international corporations in the private military sector. The purpose of this chapter is to navigate through the complex channels of existing regulation and to identify key legal gaps that lead to corporate impunity of private military companies (PMCs). This chapter also portrays PMCs as a form of power that exists in parallel to that of a state while PMC efforts in self-governance can be understood as claims to legitimacy that solidify their position further in the contemporary and future security landscape. Created by the horizontal nature of a contract between states and PMCs and amplified by the growing authority of PMCs, parallel power relationship between states and PMCs creates a model of a 'shared governance' in which PMCs are currently not recognised as actors under international law. However, the corporate status of PMCs introduces additional sources of law to invoke responsibility.
