The Australian Industry Capability (AIC) Program presents an example of hybridity where national security interests are served through a complex partnership between the Department of Defence, global prime contractors, and smaller Australian companies. Through a qualitative interview study of stakeholders in the defence industry and triangulating findings from publicly available defence industry documents, this paper aims to identify the evidence of decoupling associated with the AIC program. We find that complexity and opacity as a result of hybridity create decoupling in the implementation of the AIC program. We also find that a lack of accountability and monitoring contributes to decoupling. We advance the literature on hybridity into the context of multi-organizational arrangements in a unique industry and identify how decoupling can impede the achievement of policy objectives in the context of complex hybrid arrangements.
