ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to consider policing, in general, and private policing, in particular, in the context of debates about the changing character of governance. It helps to place the selected items in a broader context and also indicates some categories of material which have been excluded from consideration. Citizens may only be allowed access to the 'public/private places' in which they live, work and play if they accede, voluntarily, to random searches, routine surveillance, or the disclosure of personal information. These patterns of social control reflected the political and economic fragmentation of the country into independent shire-states. Shearing's contribution to the 1992 edition of Crime and Justice focuses on the relationship between public and private policing. In so doing, it makes a number of important conceptual advances, and draws attention to the connections between policing, risk, security and governance.
