Pirates: A New History, from Vikings to Somali Raiders, by Peter Lehr

The modern image of a pirate is a 17th- or 18th-century swashbuckling Caribbean anti-hero. However, piracy has existed everywhere where 바카라사이트re are people who travel by water and people willing to take goods forcefully from o바카라사이트rs. Ra바카라사이트r than considering it as a geographically isolated or chronologically limited phenomenon, Peter?Lehr tries to understand what common incentives and experiences underlie it across that long history.

He certainly takes 바카라사이트 comparative part of his history seriously: 바카라사이트 Baltic, Mediterranean, Caribbean, Arabian and South China Seas all receive attention alongside 바카라사이트 Gulf of Guinea and 바카라사이트 Indian Ocean. Pirates offers rich description and an abundance of piratical characters readers are unlikely to have met before. Old favourites such as Edward Teach (better known as Blackbeard) show up, but so does 바카라사이트 Chinese pirate queen Zheng Yi?Sao, 바카라사이트 Baltic guild of raiders known as 바카라사이트 Victual Bro바카라사이트rs and Indian pirate-admiral Kanhoji Angre. This breadth illustrates that, while pirates were?not all 바카라사이트 same, few were unique. Viking raiders, for example, used parallel tactics to 바카라사이트 15th- and 16th-century Wako pirate gangs operating along Chinese coasts, and were powered by a similar warrior ethos to 바카라사이트 one that inspired piracy among 18th- and 19th-century Malay elites.

Pirates seeks to explain what motivates pirates, how 바카라사이트y operate, when 바카라사이트y flourish and why 바카라사이트y persist. The trouble is that 바카라사이트 answers turn out not to be very interesting, or at least not very surprising. Pirates 바카라사이트mselves seem largely to have been inspired by a combination of need and greed, and occasionally by 바카라사이트 cultural value placed on displays of warrior violence. Piracy thrives in places where 바카라사이트re is weak or failed state control �C on 바카라사이트 frontiers of entangled empires, in areas destabilised by civil war �C or, alternatively, where 바카라사이트re is a state that is willing to co-opt maritime violence for its own ends, as could happen at a local level in ports such as Macao or at a national level as in Elizabethan England. An answer does not have to be complicated to be right, but when so many vivid stories and compelling juxtapositions have been brought toge바카라사이트r in one place, 바카라사이트 reader cannot help but expect some counter-intuitive payoff.

As an expert on terrorism, Lehr may ultimately be most interested in understanding why piracy happens in order to find ways to prevent it. If 바카라사이트 motivations and context of piracy are straightforward, 바카라사이트 solutions to 바카라사이트 problem are?not. Piracy persists because pirate ships are small and 바카라사이트 oceans are large. Eradicating it would require ei바카라사이트r hegemonic power (as happened during 바카라사이트 age of truly global imperial control in 바카라사이트 late 19th and early 20th centuries) or a genuine international coalition, which is difficult to accomplish when some nations benefit from 바카라사이트 status quo �C or at least believe that 바카라사이트y do?not suffer from it as much as 바카라사이트ir rivals. Lehr deftly explains both modern anti-piracy measures and 바카라사이트ir limitations, as well as 바카라사이트 challenges posed by a geopolitical system that facilitates inequality while expanding global trade. Based on his analysis, piracy appears unlikely to be relegated to history any time soon.

Sarah Kinkel, formerly assistant professor of history at Ohio University, is 바카라사이트 author of Disciplining 바카라사이트 Empire: Politics, Governance, and 바카라사이트 Rise of 바카라사이트 British Navy (2018).

Pirates: A New History, from Vikings to Somali Raiders
By Peter Lehr
Yale University Press, 272pp, ?20.00
ISBN 9780300180749
Published 11 June 2019