Dangerous seas: Moral panic and the Somali pirate

Abstract

Piracy in the coastal waters of Somalia has received significant attention from the news media and international political community, both of which have been major actors in defining the issue of piracy in and around the waters of Somalia. Drawing on the thematic frames of Cohen (1972) and Goode and Ben-Yehuda (1994), this work provides an analysis of the media and political depictions and international responses to Somali piracy, to evaluate if the phenomenon is reflective of normal societal concern or constitutes a case of ‘moral panic’. The results indicate that the media presentation and the international political community’s discourse on piracy in the Somali coastal waters have led to increased levels of fear and panic and over-reaction, resulting in an excess of militarized response to piracy. This then has negated attention being paid to the underlying causes of Somali piracy; the extant structural conditions in Somalia that have continued to facilitate increased instances of piracy. The findings suggest that a moral panic failed to materialize with the general public, rather, the reaction of the international political community, the international shipping industry, and the media’s actions correspond with the theoretical perspective of agenda-setting.