Maritime Piracy, Military Capacity, and Institutions in the Gulf of Guinea

West African security threats have become more frequent in recent years, most notably in the Gulf of Guinea. As increasing quantities of the world’s trade pass through the maritime domain, ship hijackings and other maritime criminal activities have garnered widespread attention from the international community. The International Maritime Bureau reports 785 piracy incidents have occurred in the region since 2000 and current models forecasting worldwide piracy trends have failed to accurately predict maritime crime in all of the West African states. The purpose of this article is to provide an analysis of piracy developments in the Gulf of Guinea. The authors argue that increased military capacity and anocratic regimes lead to increases in piracy while failed states are associated with a decline in such maritime crimes. Data from 2000 to 2016 is used to empirically test this claim. The analysis shows that a state’s military capacity has no impact on the prevalence of piracy events while institutional frameworks and regime type influence the degree and number of maritime attacks off the coast of West Africa. The results imply that institutionally strong and democratic regimes are less likely to experience piracy in the Gulf of Guinea than weak states or anocracies.