Lithuanian Annual Strategic Review

Countries are changing their military measures and strategies, thus they increasingly recruit private military and security companies or private military companies to pursue their interests instead of their regular forces. The aim of the research article is to reveal the motives and features of the use of private military companies in Russia’s foreign and security policy of 2014–2019. The novelty and relevance of the research object have prompted the use of the microtheory, i.e., the principal-agent theory, the application of which in political sciences has started just recently. It provides the basis for the assessment of the motives and features which led to recruitment of private military companies for the purposes of Russia’s foreign and security policy. The qualitative research method was selected in order to achieve this aim: the case analysis method was applied for the purpose of selection of the cases, i.e., regions: Syria, North-East and Central Africa, Ukraine, and Venezuela, focussing on the analysis of the factors which led to Russia’s decision to recruit private military companies instead of the regular forces.