The Invisible Hook: The Hidden Economics of Pirates

By Peter T. Leeson

Book Overview

Pack your cutlass and blunderbuss--it's time to go a-pirating The Invisible Hook takes readers inside the wily world of late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century pirates. With swashbuckling irreverence and devilish wit, Peter Leeson uncovers the hidden economics behind pirates' notorious, entertaining, and sometimes downright shocking behavior. Why did pirates fly flags of Skull & Bones? Why did they create a "pirate code"? Were pirates really ferocious madmen? And what made them so successful? The Invisible Hook uses economics to examine these and other infamous aspects of piracy. Leeson argues that the pirate customs we know and love resulted from pirates responding rationally to prevailing economic conditions in the pursuit of profits. The Invisible Hook looks at legendary pirate captains like Blackbeard, Black Bart Roberts, and Calico Jack Rackam, and shows how pirates' search for plunder led them to pioneer remarkable and forward-thinking practices. Pirates understood the advantages of constitutional democracy--a model they adopted more than fifty years before the United States did so. Pirates also initiated an early system of workers' compensation, regulated drinking and smoking, and in some cases practiced racial tolerance and equality. Leeson contends that pirates exemplified the virtues of vice--their self-seeking interests generated socially desirable effects and their greedy criminality secured social order. Pirates proved that anarchy could be organized. Revealing the democratic and economic forces propelling history's most colorful criminals, The Invisible Hook establishes pirates' trailblazing relevance to the contemporary world.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0691137471
• ISBN13: 9780691137476
• Release Date: April 2009
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 1.04 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 1.0" x 5.8"

Customer Reviews

What Could Have Been

A LIKED this, but I wanted to love it... I have read dozens of book on pirates and piracy. It is a pet subject of mine. I also read a ton about business and finance. This should have been my dream book... Instead, it functions like something of a textbook, spouting theory and removing some of the color of its primary characters. It is not bad by any stretch, and does a wonderful job of demystifying the actual day to day life of a pirate. But in doing so it removes what makes pirates so enthralling to begin with. The color of these brigands is erased in favor of theory and sound economic practice. It takes all the swashbuckling out of the pirates and makes them come across as accountants and businessmen simply doing a job. There's some truth to this idea, but it is a fraction of the story. This could have been wonderful. Instead it is not bad.