While contemporary inquiries into the theoretical linkages between political economy and security are rare, the exploration of these connections was the cornerstone of political, social and economic philosophy during the upheavals of Enlightenment Europe. "A General Police System," a term borrowed from the late 18th century thinker Patrick Colquhoun, examines the overlapping genealogies of commerce, security, surveillance, and the problem of poverty in the works of foundational English and Continental intellectuals of the 17th to early 19th centuries. This book reviews and revives the epic project of police and critically examines the drive to classify, regulate and control populations, providing a renewed materialist contribution toward a critique of security.

Security has become the pre-eminent organising principle of modern life, inextricably bound up with capital accumulation and Empire. This is the first sociological treatise on the security-industrial complex, offering a general theory of security based on a critical engagement with the works of Marx and Foucault.

While contemporary inquiries into theoretical linkages between political economy and security are rare, the exploration of these connections formed the cornerstone of political, social and economic philosophy during the upheavals of post-feudal Europe. "A General Police System," a term borrowed from the late eighteenth century thinker Patrick Colquhoun, examines the overlapping genealogies of commerce, security, surveillance and the problem of poverty in the works of foundational English and Continental thinkers of the 17th to early 19th centuries. The authors thus revive the epic project of police and critically re-examine its drive to classify, regulate and control populations, providing a renewed materialist contribution toward a contemporary critique of security.

"The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilisation... It compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilisation into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image."

Security has reached an analytic blockage. The more security seems post-political, post-social, or even post-modern the more it escapes analytic scrutiny. The more security attaches itself to innumerable social relationships the more it becomes the very glue that binds social reality. Social problems become security problems while projects of pacification continue to be legitimized under the rubric of security. To be against security today is to stand against the entire global economic system. If security has become the dominant, perhaps impenetrable concept of our times, then we must start entertaining the impossible. We must begin asking: what would doing anti-security look like? Also contains "Anti-Security: A Declaration" (by Neocleous & Rigakos) Contents: Introduction 7; Anti-Security: A Declaration 15; 1] Security as Pacification, by: Mark Neocleous; 2] 'To Extend the Scope of Productive Labour': Pacification as a Police Project, by: George S. Rigakos; 3] Public Policing, Private Security, Pacifying Populations, by: Michael Kempa; 4] War on the Poor: Urban Poverty, Target Policing and Social Control, by: Gaetan Heroux; 5] 'Poor Rogues' and Social Police: Subsistence Wages, Payday Lending and the Politics of Security, by: Olena Kobzar; 6] Liberal Intellectuals and the Politics of Security, by: Will Jackson; 7] Security: Resistance, by: Heidi Rimke; 8] Security and the Void: Aleatory Materialism contra Governmentality, by: Ronjon Paul Datta; 9] 'All the People Necessary Will Die to Achieve Security', by: Guillermina Seri; Notes on contributors ..".'punches a hole' in the body of the depressingly 'pacified' strand of scholarship that police sociology has become..." - Georgios Papanicolaou, Teeside University

"A spectre is haunting Europe - the spectre of communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: Pope and Tsar, Metternich and Guizot, French Radicals and German police-spies..."A spectre toils silently in sun-baked fields. It shuffles through dusty village squares. It slaves amidst the grime and drudgery of factory floors. It picks through the garbage of shanty-town alleys. It floats over office-tower cubicles row upon row. Wherever capitalism has had its parade our spectre follows quietly. It settles amongst the alienated, the impoverished, the exploited. It bears witness to millions of silent screams. More and more, we glimpse that ghost. But why a graphic edition? Put simply, in order to reanimate the text. To make it available to a new audience. To help us better understand our innate yearning for the promise of a better tomorrow and to re-acquaint us with a political pamphlet that forged the ideological foundations for one of the most idealistic yet repressive eras of human history.

Policing in a capitalist economy is run on both state and private levels. Much existing literature on private policing assumes that the private sector is oriented almost exclusively towards loss prevention, and does not fulfil a crime-control function. In this carefully researched study, George Rigakos considers the increasingly important role of the 'parapolice' in the maintenance of social order. He argues that for-profit policing companies adopt many of the tactics and functions of the public police, and are less distinguishable from the latter than has been previously assumed in the criminological literature.

Rigakos conducted a detailed ethnographic and statistical case study of Intelligarde International - a well-known Canadian security firm - and uses his results to investigate the following: How are discipline and surveillance achieved organizationally and commodified as 'product'? How do security agents themselves, and those they police, resist social control?

This work offers wide-ranging theoretical implications, drawing on Foucauldian concepts such as risk, surveillance, and governmentality, and on Marxian formulations of commodity and aesthetic production. The first criminological ethnography of a contract security firm in Canada, this book will be of interest to criminologists, sociologists, lawyers, and policy-makers and to any non-academic reader with an interest in the experience of those employed in the parapolice.

"Par le rapide perfectionnement des instruments de production et l'am lioration infinie des moyens de communication, la bourgeoisie entra ne dans le courant de la civilisation jusqu'aux nations les plus barbares. Le bon march de ses produits est la grosse artillerie qui bat en br che toutes les murailles de Chine et contraint la capitulation les barbares les plus opini trement hostiles aux trangers. Sous peine de mort, elle force toutes les nations adopter le mode bourgeois de production; elle les force introduire chez elle la pr tendue civilisation, c'est- -dire devenir bourgeoises. En un mot, elle se fa onne un monde son image."

"Die Bourgeoisie rei t durch die rasche Verbesserung aller Produktionsinstrumente, durch die unendlich erleichterten Kommunikationen alle, auch die barbarischsten Nationen in die Zivilisation. Die wohlfeilen Preise ihrer Waren sind die schwere Artillerie, mit der sie alle chinesischen Mauern in den Grund schie t, mit der sie den hartn ckigsten Fremdenha der Barbaren zur Kapitulation zwingt. Sie zwingt alle Nationen, die Produktionsweise der Bourgeoisie sich anzueignen, wenn sie nicht zugrunde gehn wollen; sie zwingt sie, die sogenannte Zivilisation bei sich selbst einzuf hren, d.h. Bourgeois zu werden. Mit einem Worte, sie schafft sich eine Welt nach ihrem eigenen Bilde."

"Un spectre hante l'Europe: le spectre du communisme. Toutes les puissances de la vieille Europe se sont unies en une Sainte-Alliance pour traquer ce spectre: le pape et le tsar, Metternich et Guizot, les radicaux de France et les policiers d'Allemagne..." Un spectre peine silencieusement dans les champs brules par le soleil. Il parcourt des villages dont les places sont poussiereuses. Il trime dur a des corvees sur les planchers crasseux des usines. Il fouille les ordures dans les ruelles des bidonvilles. Il flotte au-dessus des cubicules dresses en rangs serres dans les tours a bureaux. Ou le capitalisme parade, notre spectre le suit sans faire de bruit. Il s'arrete aupres des alienes, des pauvres et des exploites. Il est temoin de millions de hurlements silencieux. Et de plus en plus, nous apercevons ce fantome. Mais pourquoi une version illustree? Simplement pour revivifier le texte. Pour le rendre accessible a une nouvelle audience. Pour nous aider a mieux comprendre notre soif innee pour la promesse de meilleurs lendemains, et pour rencontrer a nouveau un pamphlet politique qui aura forge les fondations ideologiques d'une des epoques la plus idealiste - mais aussi la plus repressive - de l'histoire humaine.

"Ein Gespenst geht um in Europa - das Gespenst des Kommunismus. Alle M chte des alten Europa haben sich zu einer heiligen Hetzjagd gegen dies Gespenst verb ndet, der Papst und der Zar, Metternich und Guizot, franz sische Radikale und deutsche Polizisten..."Ein Gespenst plagt sich stumm auf ausged rrten Feldern. Es schlurft ber staubige Marktpl tze. Es plagt sich durch Schmutz und Schinderei der Fabrikflure. Es stochert durch den Abfall in den Schluchten der Slums. Es gleitet entlang der B rot rme mit ihren Gro raumb ros, Stockwerk f r Stockwerk. Wo immer sich der Kapitalismus zur Schau stellt, unser Gespenst folgt leise nach. Inmitten der Entfremdeten, Verarmten, Ausgebeuteten l sst es sich nieder. Es legt Zeugnis ab von den Millionen stummer Schreie. Immer deutlicher erkennen wir den Geist...Aber warum eine bebilderte Ausgabe? Einfach gesagt, um den Text neu zu beleben. Weiter, um ihn so einem neuen Publikum verf gbar zu machen. Schlie lich, um uns zu dabei zu helfen, eine uns allen angeborene Sehnsucht nach dem Versprechen einer besseren Zukunft besser zu verstehen. Letztlich, um uns erneut mit einer politischen Flugschrift vertraut zu machen, die das ideologische Fundament schmiedete f r eine der idealistischsten und doch zugleich repressivsten Epochen in der Menschheitsgeschichte.

"Un espectro se cierne sobre Europa: el espectro del comunismo. Contra este espectro se han conjurado en santa jauria todas las potencias de la vieja Europa, el Papa y el zar, Metternich y Guizot, los radicales franceses y los polizontes alemanes..." Un espectro trabaja sin descanso y en silencio en campos calcinados. Camina arrastrando los pies a traves de las polvorientas plazas del pueblo. Trabaja como un burro entre la mugre y la monotonia de las fabricas. Revisa la basura en callejones de barriadas. Flota sobre cubiculos de edificios de oficinas, hilera tras hilera. Donde sea que el capitalismo haya hecho sus desfiles, nuestro espectro los siguio de manera callada. Se afinca entre los excluidos, los empobrecidos, los explotados. Da testimonio de millones de gritos silenciosos. Avistamos ese fantasma, cada vez mas. Pero, por que una edicion grafica? Sencillamente: para reanimar el texto. Para que este disponible para un publico nuevo. Para ayudarnos a comprender mejor nuestro anhelo innato por la promesa de un manana mejor y para volver a familiarizarnos con un panfleto politico que forjo las bases ideologicas de una de las epocas mas idealistas y a la vez mas represivas en la historia de la humanidad.