Failure of Failed State Approaches in Explaining Piracy

• In Event: The Intersection of Criminality and War

Abstract

This study is to explore an empirical evidence of failed state impact on rising piracy. It also examines state-based macro factors, such as political, economic, and social variables, on piracy incidents. It ran multiple binary logistic regression tests to discover an empirical clue between the attributed factors and piracy incidents between 1996 and 2013. Contrary to the general understanding of contemporary piracy, the results of the analyses in this study do not find a coherently significant factor across different piracy types and periods. The results rather suggest that the effects of the macro factors, including failed state, may be conjectured through a periodic conditional effect on hijacking piracy from 2005 to 2013 when most hijacking piracy incidents were committed by Somali pirates. Then, this study discusses the critical limits of present piracy studies based on the state-centered approaches while calling for a comprehensive study delving into local contextual dynamics of piracy-prone regions.

Author

• Keunsoo Jeong, University of Pittsburgh