Not just in foreign countries, but also in Germany, according to a “forsa” public opinion survey commissioned by the Alfred Herrhausen Society, people clearly see an imminent risk from increasing criminality and violence. “In this context, international terrorism has remained a rather abstract variable,” according to Manfred Güllner, Managing Director of forsa. “Although it is perceived to be a threatening risk, in day-to-day life it is not actually considered a major cause for concern.”

The use of private security companies – without which the Iraq war would not have been possible – is controversial. This has become evident in the most recent discussions in connection with the security firm Blackwater. Approximately 20,000 employees of private security services providers were currently deployed in Iraq, according to the President of Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service (BND), at the Alfred Herrhausen Society conference. The problem with private security companies, according to the BND President, is that they operate in a legal grey zone. As legal conventions regarding their ways of working are lacking, accountability for their deployments is not subject to any direct jurisdiction.

Most people, according to the survey, have the impression that the state is not taking steps on the scale required to counteract the increase in crime. The police force numbers and equipment are considered insufficient by those surveyed. For this reason, the acceptance of private security services has risen. Former Minister of the Interior Otto Schily agreed with this perspective, called for a “global political order” and emphasized that “security had become a marketable good.”

Other participants in the conference discussion were: Christian Bommarius, Editor-in-Chief Editor of Berliner Zeitung; Günther Lachmann, author and political correspondent of Die Welt / Welt am Sonntag; Rudolf Adam, President of the Bundesakademie für Sicherheitspolitik; Jules B. Kroll, Chairman and founder of the security services firm Kroll Inc.; Professor Gunnar Folke Schuppert, expert in constitutional law at the Social Science Research Center in Berlin and Christoph Keese, Chief Editor of Welt am Sonntag.