As money markets combat the 'credit crunch', University of Sunderland politics lecturer Peter Hayes says that the root of modern democracy’s money woes may lay with early corporations – pirates.
Dr. Hayes claims that the roots of modern democracy were not in Britain or the USA, but were the ‘corporations’ which were created on pirate ships during the golden age of buccaneering: “Pirates elected their captain, voted on major decisions and distributed their booty in roughly equal shares, and there is something in the idea that a pirate ship is the equivalent of a modern corporation.
“In the 17th and 18th century privateers were backed by financiers, much like modern multi-national PLCs. The way that privateering was operating back in the golden age of buccaneering, is that a group of individuals come together, and agree to kit out a ship to sail the seven seas to see if they can pull in some gold. It was a global gamble for enormous rewards. These predatory voyages are the roots of modern venture capitalism, with these modern multi-national corporations out to get all they can get. That’s the sort privateering that led to the Credit Crunch.”
To one political scientist, he'd fit right in among modern C-suite culture.
Dr. Hayes also seems to believe modern democratic states don't really have human rights, since corporations and governments maintain power, while the more socialist structure of pirates was closer to what we believe rights are - for themselves, anyway. You may believe you bought a home, you may think you own it, but if you don't pay real estate taxes they will show you do not. Pirates believed in democracy and equality, for themselves, not their victims. So they were more like modern unions.
Privateering was encouraged by governments, including England, which was delighted about capture a Spanish ship - as long the Crown got its cut of the loot. That is why pirates were even allowed to set up their own states in places like Madagascar. It was a way to hide their wealth from larger governments, and also share information – many of those places are now havens for offshore bank accounts of modern businesses he likens to pirates.
“Eventually the state stepped in to reward successful pirates, by calling them ‘privateers’ giving them knighthoods, and making them part of society, so it is more than likely that direct descendents of pirates like Henry Morgan are wandering around the ‘deck’ of modern companies today.”
Citation: Peter Hayes, "Pirates, Privateers and the Contract Theories of Hobbes and Locke," History of Political Thought
Vol. 29, No. 3 (Autumn 2008), pp. 461-484
