The outlaw ocean : journeys across the last untamed frontier / Ian Urbina

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Storming the Thunder -- The lone patrol -- A rusty kingdom -- The scofflaw fleet -- Adelaide's voyage -- Jail without bars -- Raider of the lost arks -- The middlemen -- The next frontier -- Sea slavery -- Waste away -- Fluid borders -- Armed and dangerous -- The Somali 7 -- Hunting hunters -- Epilogue: a void -- Appendix: reining in the outlaw ocean.

There are few remaining frontiers on our planet. But perhaps the wildest, and least understood, are the world's oceans: too big to police, and with no clear international authority, the oceans have become the setting for rampant criminality - from human trafficking and slavery to environmental crimes and piracy. Now, in The Outlaw Ocean, Ian Urbina - gives us a galvanizing account of the several years he spent exploring and investigating the high seas, the industries that make use of it, and the people who make their - often criminal - living on it. He traveled on fishing boats and freighters, visited port towns and hidden outposts. He witnessed both environmental vigilantes and transgressors in action, and faced a near-mutiny aboard a police ship conveying him to a meeting point miles from the coast. He describes pursuing employment agencies and shipowners to hold them accountable for labor abuses, and traveling with a maritime repo man. Combining high drama, an investigative reporter's eye for detail, and a commitment to social justice, The Outlaw Ocean is both a gripping adventure story and a stunning exposé of some of the most disturbing realities that lie behind fishing, shipping, and, by turn, the entire global economy.

English