Toward an International Law of Piracy Sui Generis: How the Dual Nature of Maritime Piracy Law Enables Piracy to Flourish

Abstract

This article explores the divergence between international and national legal responses to maritime piracy, and it addresses the benefits of a unified international legal framework. Current domestic, regional and international legal frameworks fail to adequately combat the nature and scale of maritime piracy, which increasingly impacts the shipping, global manufacturing and tourism industries and which governments now consider to be a serious problem. As of yet, no unified legal approach exists to address the problem of modern piracy. The crux of the argument advanced in this article is that an inadvertent – yet dangerous – bifurcation of legal developments has unfolded within the field of maritime piracy, consequently creating a body of law that lacks harmony.