Aim: The aim of this paper is to present some of the characteristics of the Hungarian private security market, and thus to provide an approximate picture of the degree of market coordination involved in security provision. In this way, it will be possible to compare bureaucratic and market coordination, i.e. security provided by the state and security purchased from private providers, from a certain point of view.
Methodology: In order to assess the situation of private security companies in Hungary, the Author gives an overview of expenditure data and the number of employees of the sector, supplemented by trends in the number of companies and some additional aggregate financial data.
Findings: The involvement of private security companies can be tracked using the available statistical tools - under strong constraints. A review of these suggests that in recent years, the number of companies has shown a pattern of substantial contraction in the market, while the evolution of turnover and headcount figures shows a pattern of growth.
Value: Understanding the actors and mechanisms that exist alongside the state, and their scale, can help to improve cooperation between actors involved in policing.