This article aims to explain where, when, how and why piratical activity has taken off in Nigeria and Somalia since the 1970s. The geographical and historical conditions of the continent are compared with those of the other main region of piratical activity in the world during recent decades, Southeast Asia. A critical evaluation is then made of the available information concerning the problem and the different possible, local and global, explanations for the recent surge in African piracy, including opportunity, inequality and the proliferation of small and light weapons. The widespread notion that contemporary piracy can be explained with reference to state failure is challenged, and the rise of organized piratical activity, particularly in the Niger Delta and off the Somali coast, is instead understood as a result of the interaction of local social and political dynamics with transnational and global influences.

This study investigates criminal trajectories of individuals involved in organised crime. It combines qualitative information from the Organized Crime Monitor with rap sheets extracted from the Dutch Judicial Documentation System. A semi-parametric group model is used to cluster 854 individuals into groups with similar developmental trajectories, preceding the organised crime index case. Four judicial trajectories are identified: an early starters group with a high peak in late adolescence (11 percent); a persistent group of offenders with crimes from early adolescence until adulthood (30 percent); a unique group of adult onset offenders (40 percent); and a group of offenders without judicial contacts prior to the index case (19 percent). Largely, suspects who fulfilled different roles in criminal groups (leaders, coordinators, lower-level suspects) are equally distributed over the trajectory groups and the same applies to different types of criminal activities.