Business Improvement Associations and Public Area Video Surveillance in Canadian Cities

This article examines how business improvement associations (BIAs) become involved in implementing public video surveillance systems in Canadian cities. The approach of BIAs to urban security is more complex than the literature on neo-liberalisation of public space suggests and it is shown how BIAs adopt lead, junior or reluctant partnership roles in implementing and writing policy for public video surveillance. Interview data from four Canadian cities are used to demonstrate how BIAs take on different positions in video surveillance policy-making and implementation. The article explores how local and regional policy contexts shape a BIA’s ability to pursue revitalisation projects and illustrates the way that provincial privacy guidelines function as a key policy instrument in the Canadian context. The article concludes by assessing what these findings add to literature on the neo-liberalisation of public space and urban studies.