Measuring the military decline of the Western Islamic World: Evidence from Barbary ransoms

Eric Chaney

Explorations in Economic History, 2015, vol. 58, issue C, 107-124

Abstract: This paper uses data on more than 4000 captives ransomed from the Barbary corsairs to track the military power of the Ottoman Empire's most powerful North African regency over time. Results suggest that as the seventeenth century advanced, Algerian-based corsairs found it increasingly difficult to capture “hard” targets. These results do not appear to be driven by changes in ransoming preferences or by other unobserved factors and provide insights into both the timing and reasons behind the military decline of the Western Islamic World.

Keywords: Piracy; Ottoman Empire; Military power; Great divergence; State capacity; Technological change (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:exehis:v:58:y:2015:i:c:p:107-124

DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2015.03.002

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