Until recently, private police work has been ignored by criminologists primarily concerned with the activity of the public police force. Johnston provides an original view of police history focusing on the emergence of the private police sector as the embodiment of the growing privatization of authority in society.

The book's analysis of current developments in private policing compel the reader to re-assess the conventional distinction between "public" and "private" authority so often taken for granted in social and political theory. The Rebirth of Private Policing introduces a provocative analysis of the role of policing of interest to anyone concerned with the question of social control and the state.