Private policing currently outstrips public police organizations in Canada in terms of the number of people employed, the range of policing services, and the variety of domains in which the services are provided. Over the years, public police agencies have gone through several stages of responses to private policing: denial of the existence of private policing; grudging recognition; competition, sometimes accompanied by open hostility; calls for more controls over private policing organizations and activities; and active partnership. Most public police leaders are in this stage. However, attitudinal change should go further and should lead to the development of equal partnerships instead of the current situation, in which the public police regard themselves as the senior partners. This partnership should go beyond a sharing of ideas and experiences and should involve working together to plan and achieve effective policing in a community. Private police have already developed many advances in community policing, victim services, complex and transnational crime, and crime prevention and should be an integral part of police planning. 15 references.