Economist who applies rational choice and institutional economics to historical ungoverned societies — most famously pirates — showing that seemingly irrational or chaotic systems often have sophisticated governance logic.
The Invisible Hook: Leeson's analysis of Golden Age piracy (1696-1726) shows pirates as rational economic actors who created governance institutions (democratic constitutions, separation of powers, compensation schemes for injury) that solved collective action problems without external enforcement. Pirates flew flags as branding strategies, ran democratic crews to solve principal-agent problems, and tortured prisoners according to rational signaling logic. A tour de force application of institutional economics to one of history's most romanticized outlaw cultures.
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