Piracy and the broader ‘gun business’ in the Niger Delta

Abstract Piracy cannot be understood in isolation from other (criminal) engagements, but how can we explore such linkages and why is it relevant to understand their implications, both for piracy and counterpiracy? Appreciating that Niger Delta-based piracy has dropped to historically low levels, this article explores what pirates do when they do not sustain themselves by engaging in piracy. As such, the article offers novel empirical insights into underexplored dimensions of piracy. Moreover, we use this case-study to demonstrate the relevance of an infrastructure-inspired conceptualization much beyond analyses of piracy and counterpiracy. Showing how piracy is linked to broader and often violent infrastructures that interventions leave unaddressed, and stressing key implications of the continuity and change in such linkages, is a first step towards appreciating the centrality of a broader dilemma that intervention actors confront: how to conceptualize the necessity to delimit a problem, while appreciating the significance of problem-dimensions left unaddressed? Our suggestion is that an infrastructure-inspired approach offers a helpful starting-point, a suggestion that we demonstrate in an analysis of how Niger Delta-based piracy forms part of a broader ‘gun business’ landscape, which does not only entail different types of crime but also various types of victims.