This article re-examines piracy not merely as a historical criminal phenomenon, but as a potent form of counterpower shaping the Mediterranean’s political, economic, and cultural geography. Focusing on Malta’s centuries-long history of corsairing and maritime trade, the piece argues that piracy served as a strategic engine of growth — with fleets, ransom economies, and slave trade — that significantly impacted Mediterranean networks of circulation and power.
By re-activating the metaphor of piracy in contemporary contexts — from financial-digital hubs to migrant rescue operations and artistic practices — the work proposes piracy as a critical lens to reconsider modern Mediterranean infrastructures of trade, labor, and resistance.