Pirate economics

Bargain like a Somali

How to negotiate with pirates in the Horn of Africa

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Readers' comments



Zachary RAD Rouse

I am 100% certain that there is a running inside joke on who can come up with the most elaborate over-legitimizing analysis on Somali pirates.

Which includes an award for most complex graph/chart.

Connect The Dots



This dispels the myth that Muslim Pirates are victims of global warming and overfishing of seas.
They have been doing piracy and hostage taking for OVER 500 YEARS!
It is a family business, a trade taught from father to son and a respected profession.
Apparently the Koran permits kidnapping or slave taking if the hostages are infidels.
They let pass any Muslim flagged ships.

The solution is NOT better fish conservation.
Or effectively combating global warming.
Or providing a factory to turn fish into t-shirts.

The solution is to annihilate the pirates.
They only understand violence.
And negotiation must be in kind.

Lubumbashi in reply to Terence Hale

"beads and plastic joules"
What an ignorant thing to say.

The Somalis have have been trading since before the expedition of Queen Hatshepsut around 2500BC. It's not known what the Queen paid for her haul of monkeys, giraffes, ebony and frankincense, but it seems more likely the Somalis were paid in gold, not beads.


It must be good to be Somali these days. Work as a pirate for a few years, save some money, then claim refugee status and get set up for a free flight and rent in Sweden or Minnesota for the rest of your life.


This jives with my experience. A few years ago, I went with a tourist group to a rug co-op in Marakesh, Morocco. Several of us purchased rugs and compared bargaining strategies afterwards. The most successful bargainer among us simply waited noncommittally...and waited...and waited, 'till the salesman came down to a price he wanted.

erik bloodaxe

Quote "They found that Somali pirates pretend to be more sophisticated than they are, whereas shipowners pretend to be poorer".

Now there is a surprise! Who would have guessed that they'd use such deceptive tactics without a research paper to prove it.

The words think, born, we, yesterday, must, they, were and all spring to mind.

The Last Conformist in reply to shubrook

Haven't read the study, but as a general thing, the early modern "barbary" pirates were based at various points from Libya to Morocco, the best known centre being Algiers.

And, of course, they weren't by any means the first Muslim pirates. CTD appears to be thoroughly clueless about the subject.


The tenets of negotiation are universal and are practiced everywhere except perhaps America where the fixed price is king. After living in China where I haggled for everything, I found ordinary Americans I met through Craigslist transactions to be shockingly incompetent negotiators.

RazibTaif in reply to Boredome

I made the mistake of coming to the West as the son of an engineer who taught me to love science, integrate into Western culture and work for a living. I know, I know, I'm a left-wing self hating hippy's nightmare.

Nic Roets

Now suppose the White House, Bruzzels and all the Asian countries with large commercial fleets work together to find the optimal strategy for dealing with the pirates.

Could it be that the long term optimal solution is to place a very low ceiling on what ship owners may pay the pirates ? At some point the pirates make losses and go out of business.


Short memories?... let's not forget that the some famous pirates worked for governments. E.g. Drake proved very profitable to Queen Elizabeth I

Oronym in reply to Connect The Dots

.... or perhaps a rethink on the use of flags on ships since current practice clearly gives them easy ID of targets. If all ships used Muslim flags or removed all ID for that leg of the journey, perhaps the pickings would be far from easy.

Terence Hale

Pirate economics: “The Pirates of Penzance” Can Economics learn something from the Somali pirates? In colonial times one would offer beads and plastic joules. Now being purchased from the seller that sold them they, the gentleman of Somalia have discovered a new language. Is this the evolution of organised crime?



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