Democratic countries such as the United States, Great Britain, and Canada have reached a watershed in the evolution of their crime control and law enforcement systems. Policing is no longer monopolized by public police agencies and policing is now being widely offered by private agencies. Further, public police agencies are going through an intense period of self-questioning or identity crisis. The increase in the number of private police over the past 30 years has markedly improved the status of private police agencies and has meant policing has become a responsibility explicitly shared between government and citizens. Public police agencies are rethinking their role and organizational structure not only in response to the increase in private police agencies but also in the context of community-oriented and crime-oriented policing. The effect of restructuring public and private police agencies on public safety, human rights, and civic accountability is discussed. The future of policing is examined in terms of crime, fear of crime, the absence of ameliorative social policies, the ineffectiveness of deterrence, the rise of mass private property, and the view of public security as a commodity. The authors indicate that community policing in particular faces substantial obstacles and will not be easy to achieve and that community policing will work to offset the socially divisive effects of police restructuring only to the extent that it empowers communities to take responsibility for themselves. 27 references