Private Military and Security Companies and the European Union as an Enmeshed Security and Defence Actor

Abstract This article argues that extensive use of private military and security companies (PMSCs) makes the European Union (EU) an enmeshed security and defence actor. This is an actor spanning the public and the private domains as well as the resources, rules and practices of the EU member states and of EU‐level institutions. Enmeshment, in Leander's (2014) terms, leads to recombination and blending of rules, resources and practices from multiple domains. Our findings based on (a) an analysis of the EU's rules for contracting PMSCs and (b) a new data set of 564 PMSCs linked with the EU in the period 2014–2023 suggest that the EU and its member states systematically tap into resources of the private military and security industry in conducting their security and defence policies. The resulting enmeshment processes call for a reconceptualization of the EU as a security and defence actor.