Mercenaries, Pirates, and Sovereigns: State-Building and Extraterritorial Violence in Early Modern Europe

First, it should be noted that this one was published in 1994, so Ch. 1 might be outdated as global political theory has changed since then! This is not a timeline of the Golden Age of Piracy, but a look at early non-state violence in the Western world starting in the 17th c. and its modern repercussions.

Problem is, the premise holds up well enough in regards to hired mercenaries and mercantile armies, but not Golden Age pirates or privateers. The author draws a harsh line between the two when in reality that line is blurred. There was piratical privateering, pirates that hunted other pirates, pirate/privateer brokering, pirates that became privateers and vice versa. The author also fails to mention that pirates were tried outside of show more common law, by admiralty courts; gov't entities that even the mercantile companies answered to. Their argument that privateering generated organized piracy is also an oversimplification. Unemployment in peacetime, horrendous conditions and low pay generated piracy regardless (see Stede Bonnet!). Unintentionally, the mercantile companies even end up fitting the author's definition of piracy. Once the argument is made, the author then backtracks by stating that piracy was undefinable.

However, in the latter half of the book, into the 19th c, the pieces start to come together. With the elimination of privateering, this was the era of centralized power for the East India Company and others. Monopolies, investment bubbles, and the race to claim the East absolutely led to non-state and state sanctioned global violence. The commercial reorganization of India, China, Java, and the effects of the fight between a handful of European nations over huge swathes of foreign land is still seen today. The author found their footing in the end, despite not covering the "six proceeding centuries" although the last two are more than enough. show less