Public-Private Partnerships in Homeland Security: Opportunities and Challenges

Public-private partnerships are a major issue of discussion in businesses and government agencies concerned with homeland security. However, this issue has received a much less thorough treatment in scholarly literature on homeland security. This article begins to fill a gap in homeland security scholarship by identifying the essential role that public-private partnerships are now taking in homeland security and by examining opportunities and challenges for this transformative shift in the field. The article begins by contextualizing our argument within recent scholarship, and tracing the development of public-private partnerships in homeland security. The article then examines the growing role of public-private sector partnerships in homeland security. The article concludes by discussing ongoing challenges that will need to be considered and addressed for public-private partnerships to be successful over the long term.