For my Perspective Analyses I will be focusing on primarily European continental pirates, operating in the Caribbean, during the “Golden Age of Piracy”, which lasted from about 1670 to 1780, with some statistics outside of that period or demographic.
DEFINITION
Piracy (as defined by reference.com): A pirate is one who robs or plunders at sea without a commission from a recognized sovereign nation. Pirates usually target other ships, but have also attacked targets on shore. These acts are known as piracy.
Piracy (as defined by Encyclopedia Britannica): robbery committed or attempted on the high seas.
High Seas (as defined by reference.com): The terms international waters or transboundary waters apply where bodies of water (or their drainage basins) transcend international boundaries. For oceans and seas, waters outside of national jurisdiction are also referred to as the High Seas.
PIRACY
Piracy (Buccaneers (boucan, barbacoa), vrijbuiter (free-loot-agent), Flibustiers (and later into Filibustering), Freebooters, etc)
Actually began around 1350 BC, when Lukka raiders attacked shipping from the coast of Asia Minor (http://pirateshold.buccaneersoft.com/pirate_timeline.html)
We’re familiar with the more modern incarnation, of which you see fanciful renderings in films like Pirates of the Caribbean and books like Treasure Island.
Pirates traditionally focused on moneys and valuable material (whalers were plagued by pirates, as was the Spanish navy during Spain’s rape of the South Americas), but slavery eventually became more profitable. Many pirate expeditions ditched robbery for the more straightforward practice of smuggling slaves.
PRIVATEERING
Privateering (Corsairs (cursa->latin for raid, expedition, inroad): A privateer or corsair was similar to a pirate in method but had a commission or a letter of marque from a government or king to capture merchant ships belonging to an enemy nation.
Mostly ended in 1854 @ Declaration of Paris, England continued hiring Privateers (Sir Francis Drake, who became a hero to the British and a personal friend to Queen Elizabeth, despite her inability to acknowledge his accomplishments due to English-Spanish politics.)
SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES (WHY PIRACY?)
Anomie-Strain Theory: Social structures exert a definite pressure upon certain persons in the society to engage in nonconforming rather than conforming conduct.
“[Culturally defined] goals, purposes, and interests…” (at time of Golden Age):
Survival (serious concern)->Wealth, Power, Prestige, Freedom (to a certain extent/from oppression).
“…confines, regulates, and controls acceptable modes of reaching out for these goals” (at time of Golden Age):
Government->State-sponsored military: “Many procedures which from the standpoint of particular individuals would be most efficient in securing desired values…”
Church: “…value laden sentiments (supported by most members of the group or by those able to promote these sentiments through the composite use of power or propaganda).”
“-the exercise of force, fraud, power-are ruled out of the institutional area of permitted conduct.”
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Modern parallels to Piracy (contemporary examples of organized, violent crime; social perceptions): struggle to reach societally acceptable goals through societally unacceptable means?
Possible A’s: White-collar Crime, Mafia/Mob, Drug Cartels, Plastic Surgery (less and less so), Steroid Use, Shoplifting (clothes, accessories, etc).
Q: Assuming survival, wealth, piety, and power were the socially acceptable goals people of the 17th century, have those goals changed over time? Which have remained constant? Has society added new goals to these over time?
Possible A’s: Wealth/Power have remained, focus on power now more monetarily based. Beauty, Gender Roles of individuals have become increasingly more important to define for society at large. Survival less a concern. Christian piety has changed and become National Ideologies (ie, Freedom, Cultural Integrity, etc).
Differential Association Theory: Criminal Behavior is learned (in interaction with other persons in a process of communication, principally within intimate personal groups). The learning includes techniques of committing the crime and the specific direction of motives, drives, rationalizations, and attitudes, which are learned from definitions of the legal codes as favorable or unfavorable. A person becomes delinquent because of an excess of definitions favorable to violation of law over definitions unfavorable to violation of law. Differential associations may vary in frequency, duration, priority, and intensity. The process of learning criminal behavior by association with criminal and anticriminal patterns involves all of the mechanisms that are involved in any other learning. While criminal behavior is an expression of general needs and values, it is not explained by those general needs and values, since non-criminal behavior is an expression of those same needs and values.
The best way to interpret Piracy through Differential Association theory is through the common practices of the Militaries before and during the Golden Age of Piracy and the conflicts that arose between the two main sources of authority during the time because those practices (Church and State).
Church Values: Righteousness (of individual actions): Mercy, Charity, Spirituality, Brotherhood with fellow man (to a certain extent).
State Values: Righteousness (of state actions): Wealth, Power, Survival
The constantly violent nature (and therefore, values) of the military conflicted with the societally accepted values of the church fostered an excess of definitions favorable to violation of the law (whereas law is replaced by common values). Deviant behavior (violent robbery) was learned by the military because it was common practice, and individuals were encouraged to diverge from legality of their state because their captains were telling them that things that were illegal (read: immoral) were acceptable. These attitudes were not confined to the nautical sphere: rape (albeit more acceptable then than now), robbery, and arson were employed against “others” by all the militaries of the time, engendering a popular perspective of delinquency (read: devaiance) in the military (from which the first pirates diverged, and was the source of much of the piracy of that age).
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Can you think of any contemporary examples of authority conflicts resulting in a popular action of socially unacceptable means of pursuing goals? (Have them explain.)
Possible A’s: Media and State/Education (violence (gang/other), drugs, sexuality, etc).
Social Control Theory: Delinquent acts result when an individuals bond to societal rules is broken.
Commitment: cost/risk analysis. Are the gains of piracy worth the consequences of being caught?
A: Simply, yes. Values were wealth, power, and survival. All three of these are qualitatively enhanced by piracy. The penalty for engaging in piracy was death, but individuals hardly ever concern themselves with the consequences if they think they won’t get caught, or if the alternative to illegal activity is similar to the punishment for engaging in it. (Poverty, Press Gangs)
Involvement: Is the person too involved in socially acceptable means of pursuing goals to pursue piracy? Do they have the time to pillage and plunder?
A: The socially acceptable means of pursuing goals in 17th Century Europe were constructed with the primary effect of keeping those who were poor in poverty. There were few (and no easy) ways to pursue the goals of Wealth and Power without resorting to illegal means.
Belief: Does the pirate reject social mores or does he rationalize his behavior within those mores? (Variation)
A: Most pirates flat out rejected the morals of “mainstream” society, mostly because of the lack of social mobility when confined by those morals. As is seen in the sample pirate code, they developed their own set of social rules by which to live, which more closely mirror the liberty-centric governments of today than do the “legitimate” governments during the Golden Age.
These were the articles used by the ship Revenge which was commanded by Captain John Phillips.
Article One
Every man shall obey civil command; the captain shall have on full share and a half in all prizes. the Master, Carpenter, Boatswain, and Gunner shall have one share and quarter.
Article Two
If any man shall offer to run away, or keep any secret from the Company, he shall be marroon'd with one bottle of powder, one bottle of Water, one small Arm, and shot.
Article Three
If any Man shall steal any Thing in the Company, or game, to the value of a piece of Eight, he shall be Marroon'd or shot.
Article Four
If at any Time we should meet at another Marrooner (that is, Pyrate) that man shall sign his Articles without Consent of our Company, shall suffer such Punishment as the Captain and Company shall think fit.
Article Five
That a man that shall strike another, whilst these Articles are in force, shall receive Moses's Law (that is 40 Stripes lacking one) on the bare Back.
Article Six
That Man that shall snap his Arms, or smoak Tobacco in the Hold, without cap to his Pipe, or carry a candle lighted without lanthorn, shall suffer the same Punishment as in the former Article.
Article Seven
That Man that shall not keep his Arms clean, fit for an Engagement, or neglect his Business, shall be cut off from his Share, and suffer such other Punishment as the Captain and Company shall think fit.
Article eight
If any man shall lose a joint in time of Engagement, shall have 400 Pieces of Eight: if a limb, 800.
Article Nine
If at any time you meet with a prudent Woman, that Man that offers to meddle with her, without her Consent, shall suffer Death.
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Can you think of any examples where people without social mobility have resorted to illegal means of self-promotion?
Possible A’s: Drug trade, KKK, Booze-Running during Prohibition
Q: Can you think of any examples where people lacking opportunity have broken from mainstream culture and have created their own social rules and mores?
A: American blacks before 1960, today in inner cities. Pilgrims. Declaration of Independence.
________________________________________________________________________
Social Conflict Theory: Crime, as officially determined, is a definition of behavior that is conferred on some people by those in power. Definitions of crime are formulated according to the interests of those who have the power to translate their interests into public policy. The powerful interests are reflected not only in the definitions of crime and the kinds of penal sanctions attached to them, but also in the legal policies on handling those defined as criminals. The dominant interests intervene in all the stages at which definitions of crime are created.
“An ideology of crime is constructed and diffused by the dominant class to secure its hegemony.” (Quinney)
Shipping was in the interests of primarily the dominant class (landed nobles, ie, Government) and somewhat that of the middle merchant class (which had significant political clout). Shipping fulfilled three purposes, directly descended from, and contributing to, the pursuit of wealth:
#1: Money allowed for military->political power outside the country, which resulted in peace among state-peers, wars of conquest with weaker states, sanction of the church (leading to #2), and holding of colonies (leading to more shipping-> money).
#2: Money allowed for societal control within the country, ie political power, as seen in merchant class despite traditional power structures, which resulted in favorable laws-> money, and #3.
#3: Money allowed for the improvement of one’s life (luxury, servants, housing, property, etc).
Because the benefits of shipping were so great to the powerful class, and invasion of that benefit was perpetrated primarily by those outside the nation and the lower classes within the nation, violating that privilege rapidly became a severely taboo act, with the harshest penalties imaginable.
Social Control theory states that: “Because it is not the quality of the behavior but the action taken against the behavior that gives it the character of criminality, that which is defined as criminal is relative to the behavior patterns of the class that formulates and applies definitions.”
We see a perfect example of this statement in the utilization of privateers. They were still pursuing acts of piracy, but because the piracy was not perpetrated against the “behavior patterns of the class that formulates and applies definitions”, it was not considered criminal.
Today, the law is slightly different. A radical proponent of Social Control Theory would argue that our perception of piracy has changed only because there is more international cooperation in trade, and that it is not that laws against piracy are Jus Cogens (“compelling law” in Latin, a fundamental principle of international law that is to everyone’s universal benefit) that piracy is labeled a crime against humanity but because it violates the capitalist upper-class of ALL countries (due to our new, cooperative system of trade), and those practicing it may be tried in any competent court, regardless of nationality.
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Given our recent discussion on Drug laws, what parallels can you draw between piracy and drug use?
Possible A’s: Social control (drug laws primarily impacting disadvantaged minority groups).
STATISTICS
ICC 2004 Piracy Report:
30 murders, up from 21 (in 2003)
325 attacks, down from 445 (in 2003)
No reliable statistics were available for piracy before 1985, although at the time of the Golden Age it was considered the second greatest problem behind costly wars for most of the nautical super-powers (Britain, France, Spain, and Portugal), in part because it hindered those wars. Also, relatively wealthy, coastal communities were plagued by pirates (the United States and Canada foremost among these), and Canada, at least, made up for their lack of a standing navy by simply hiring many of these pirates on as privateers to defend against their former compatriots.
DEFINITION
Piracy (as defined by reference.com): A pirate is one who robs or plunders at sea without a commission from a recognized sovereign nation. Pirates usually target other ships, but have also attacked targets on shore. These acts are known as piracy.
Piracy (as defined by Encyclopedia Britannica): robbery committed or attempted on the high seas.
High Seas (as defined by reference.com): The terms international waters or transboundary waters apply where bodies of water (or their drainage basins) transcend international boundaries. For oceans and seas, waters outside of national jurisdiction are also referred to as the High Seas.
PIRACY
Piracy (Buccaneers (boucan, barbacoa), vrijbuiter (free-loot-agent), Flibustiers (and later into Filibustering), Freebooters, etc)
Actually began around 1350 BC, when Lukka raiders attacked shipping from the coast of Asia Minor (http://pirateshold.buccaneersoft.com/pirate_timeline.html)
We’re familiar with the more modern incarnation, of which you see fanciful renderings in films like Pirates of the Caribbean and books like Treasure Island.
Pirates traditionally focused on moneys and valuable material (whalers were plagued by pirates, as was the Spanish navy during Spain’s rape of the South Americas), but slavery eventually became more profitable. Many pirate expeditions ditched robbery for the more straightforward practice of smuggling slaves.
PRIVATEERING
Privateering (Corsairs (cursa->latin for raid, expedition, inroad): A privateer or corsair was similar to a pirate in method but had a commission or a letter of marque from a government or king to capture merchant ships belonging to an enemy nation.
Mostly ended in 1854 @ Declaration of Paris, England continued hiring Privateers (Sir Francis Drake, who became a hero to the British and a personal friend to Queen Elizabeth, despite her inability to acknowledge his accomplishments due to English-Spanish politics.)
SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES (WHY PIRACY?)
Anomie-Strain Theory: Social structures exert a definite pressure upon certain persons in the society to engage in nonconforming rather than conforming conduct.
“[Culturally defined] goals, purposes, and interests…” (at time of Golden Age):
Survival (serious concern)->Wealth, Power, Prestige, Freedom (to a certain extent/from oppression).
“…confines, regulates, and controls acceptable modes of reaching out for these goals” (at time of Golden Age):
Government->State-sponsored military: “Many procedures which from the standpoint of particular individuals would be most efficient in securing desired values…”
Church: “…value laden sentiments (supported by most members of the group or by those able to promote these sentiments through the composite use of power or propaganda).”
“-the exercise of force, fraud, power-are ruled out of the institutional area of permitted conduct.”
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Modern parallels to Piracy (contemporary examples of organized, violent crime; social perceptions): struggle to reach societally acceptable goals through societally unacceptable means?
Possible A’s: White-collar Crime, Mafia/Mob, Drug Cartels, Plastic Surgery (less and less so), Steroid Use, Shoplifting (clothes, accessories, etc).
Q: Assuming survival, wealth, piety, and power were the socially acceptable goals people of the 17th century, have those goals changed over time? Which have remained constant? Has society added new goals to these over time?
Possible A’s: Wealth/Power have remained, focus on power now more monetarily based. Beauty, Gender Roles of individuals have become increasingly more important to define for society at large. Survival less a concern. Christian piety has changed and become National Ideologies (ie, Freedom, Cultural Integrity, etc).
Differential Association Theory: Criminal Behavior is learned (in interaction with other persons in a process of communication, principally within intimate personal groups). The learning includes techniques of committing the crime and the specific direction of motives, drives, rationalizations, and attitudes, which are learned from definitions of the legal codes as favorable or unfavorable. A person becomes delinquent because of an excess of definitions favorable to violation of law over definitions unfavorable to violation of law. Differential associations may vary in frequency, duration, priority, and intensity. The process of learning criminal behavior by association with criminal and anticriminal patterns involves all of the mechanisms that are involved in any other learning. While criminal behavior is an expression of general needs and values, it is not explained by those general needs and values, since non-criminal behavior is an expression of those same needs and values.
The best way to interpret Piracy through Differential Association theory is through the common practices of the Militaries before and during the Golden Age of Piracy and the conflicts that arose between the two main sources of authority during the time because those practices (Church and State).
Church Values: Righteousness (of individual actions): Mercy, Charity, Spirituality, Brotherhood with fellow man (to a certain extent).
State Values: Righteousness (of state actions): Wealth, Power, Survival
The constantly violent nature (and therefore, values) of the military conflicted with the societally accepted values of the church fostered an excess of definitions favorable to violation of the law (whereas law is replaced by common values). Deviant behavior (violent robbery) was learned by the military because it was common practice, and individuals were encouraged to diverge from legality of their state because their captains were telling them that things that were illegal (read: immoral) were acceptable. These attitudes were not confined to the nautical sphere: rape (albeit more acceptable then than now), robbery, and arson were employed against “others” by all the militaries of the time, engendering a popular perspective of delinquency (read: devaiance) in the military (from which the first pirates diverged, and was the source of much of the piracy of that age).
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Can you think of any contemporary examples of authority conflicts resulting in a popular action of socially unacceptable means of pursuing goals? (Have them explain.)
Possible A’s: Media and State/Education (violence (gang/other), drugs, sexuality, etc).
Social Control Theory: Delinquent acts result when an individuals bond to societal rules is broken.
Commitment: cost/risk analysis. Are the gains of piracy worth the consequences of being caught?
A: Simply, yes. Values were wealth, power, and survival. All three of these are qualitatively enhanced by piracy. The penalty for engaging in piracy was death, but individuals hardly ever concern themselves with the consequences if they think they won’t get caught, or if the alternative to illegal activity is similar to the punishment for engaging in it. (Poverty, Press Gangs)
Involvement: Is the person too involved in socially acceptable means of pursuing goals to pursue piracy? Do they have the time to pillage and plunder?
A: The socially acceptable means of pursuing goals in 17th Century Europe were constructed with the primary effect of keeping those who were poor in poverty. There were few (and no easy) ways to pursue the goals of Wealth and Power without resorting to illegal means.
Belief: Does the pirate reject social mores or does he rationalize his behavior within those mores? (Variation)
A: Most pirates flat out rejected the morals of “mainstream” society, mostly because of the lack of social mobility when confined by those morals. As is seen in the sample pirate code, they developed their own set of social rules by which to live, which more closely mirror the liberty-centric governments of today than do the “legitimate” governments during the Golden Age.
These were the articles used by the ship Revenge which was commanded by Captain John Phillips.
Article One
Every man shall obey civil command; the captain shall have on full share and a half in all prizes. the Master, Carpenter, Boatswain, and Gunner shall have one share and quarter.
Article Two
If any man shall offer to run away, or keep any secret from the Company, he shall be marroon'd with one bottle of powder, one bottle of Water, one small Arm, and shot.
Article Three
If any Man shall steal any Thing in the Company, or game, to the value of a piece of Eight, he shall be Marroon'd or shot.
Article Four
If at any Time we should meet at another Marrooner (that is, Pyrate) that man shall sign his Articles without Consent of our Company, shall suffer such Punishment as the Captain and Company shall think fit.
Article Five
That a man that shall strike another, whilst these Articles are in force, shall receive Moses's Law (that is 40 Stripes lacking one) on the bare Back.
Article Six
That Man that shall snap his Arms, or smoak Tobacco in the Hold, without cap to his Pipe, or carry a candle lighted without lanthorn, shall suffer the same Punishment as in the former Article.
Article Seven
That Man that shall not keep his Arms clean, fit for an Engagement, or neglect his Business, shall be cut off from his Share, and suffer such other Punishment as the Captain and Company shall think fit.
Article eight
If any man shall lose a joint in time of Engagement, shall have 400 Pieces of Eight: if a limb, 800.
Article Nine
If at any time you meet with a prudent Woman, that Man that offers to meddle with her, without her Consent, shall suffer Death.
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Can you think of any examples where people without social mobility have resorted to illegal means of self-promotion?
Possible A’s: Drug trade, KKK, Booze-Running during Prohibition
Q: Can you think of any examples where people lacking opportunity have broken from mainstream culture and have created their own social rules and mores?
A: American blacks before 1960, today in inner cities. Pilgrims. Declaration of Independence.
________________________________________________________________________
Social Conflict Theory: Crime, as officially determined, is a definition of behavior that is conferred on some people by those in power. Definitions of crime are formulated according to the interests of those who have the power to translate their interests into public policy. The powerful interests are reflected not only in the definitions of crime and the kinds of penal sanctions attached to them, but also in the legal policies on handling those defined as criminals. The dominant interests intervene in all the stages at which definitions of crime are created.
“An ideology of crime is constructed and diffused by the dominant class to secure its hegemony.” (Quinney)
Shipping was in the interests of primarily the dominant class (landed nobles, ie, Government) and somewhat that of the middle merchant class (which had significant political clout). Shipping fulfilled three purposes, directly descended from, and contributing to, the pursuit of wealth:
#1: Money allowed for military->political power outside the country, which resulted in peace among state-peers, wars of conquest with weaker states, sanction of the church (leading to #2), and holding of colonies (leading to more shipping-> money).
#2: Money allowed for societal control within the country, ie political power, as seen in merchant class despite traditional power structures, which resulted in favorable laws-> money, and #3.
#3: Money allowed for the improvement of one’s life (luxury, servants, housing, property, etc).
Because the benefits of shipping were so great to the powerful class, and invasion of that benefit was perpetrated primarily by those outside the nation and the lower classes within the nation, violating that privilege rapidly became a severely taboo act, with the harshest penalties imaginable.
Social Control theory states that: “Because it is not the quality of the behavior but the action taken against the behavior that gives it the character of criminality, that which is defined as criminal is relative to the behavior patterns of the class that formulates and applies definitions.”
We see a perfect example of this statement in the utilization of privateers. They were still pursuing acts of piracy, but because the piracy was not perpetrated against the “behavior patterns of the class that formulates and applies definitions”, it was not considered criminal.
Today, the law is slightly different. A radical proponent of Social Control Theory would argue that our perception of piracy has changed only because there is more international cooperation in trade, and that it is not that laws against piracy are Jus Cogens (“compelling law” in Latin, a fundamental principle of international law that is to everyone’s universal benefit) that piracy is labeled a crime against humanity but because it violates the capitalist upper-class of ALL countries (due to our new, cooperative system of trade), and those practicing it may be tried in any competent court, regardless of nationality.
+++DISCUSSION QUESTION(s)+++
Q: Given our recent discussion on Drug laws, what parallels can you draw between piracy and drug use?
Possible A’s: Social control (drug laws primarily impacting disadvantaged minority groups).
STATISTICS
ICC 2004 Piracy Report:
30 murders, up from 21 (in 2003)
325 attacks, down from 445 (in 2003)
No reliable statistics were available for piracy before 1985, although at the time of the Golden Age it was considered the second greatest problem behind costly wars for most of the nautical super-powers (Britain, France, Spain, and Portugal), in part because it hindered those wars. Also, relatively wealthy, coastal communities were plagued by pirates (the United States and Canada foremost among these), and Canada, at least, made up for their lack of a standing navy by simply hiring many of these pirates on as privateers to defend against their former compatriots.
posted by evan at 9:14 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home