Haass has been a PEU since 2007. He saw the potential for PEU influence in early 2006:
The world’s 190-plus states now co-exist with a larger number of powerful non-sovereign and at least partly (and often largely) independent actors, ranging from corporations to non-government organisations (NGOs), from terrorist groups to drug cartels, from regional and global institutions to banks and private equity funds.
I see private equity as belonging toward the terrorist/drug cartel end of the independent actor spectrum. Certainly, not everyone agrees, as politicians Red & Blue love PEU. D.C. falls all over them.
