The paradox of gendarmeries : between expansion, demilitarization and dissolution

Abstract

Over the past two decades the evolution of the security landscape in Western Europe (and elsewhere) has been characterized by an increasing blurring of internal and external security. Many contemporary security challenges – such as international terrorism and transnational organized crime – no longer neatly fit into one category, as they typically have both internal and external dimensions. For security institutions, especially the police and the military, this means that their roles have increasingly converged, for example with military forces becoming more involved in domestic security, or traditionally domestic security forces, such as the police, playing an increasingly prominent role at the international level.