The European Security and Defense College (ESDC) held a course on contemporary piracy in Rome. The program was attended by over 30 professionals, many of which senior, from across Europe, and covered the full spectrum of the challenges of contemporary piracy, ranging from deterrence, surveillance and interruption at sea, prosecution and transfer of suspects to capacity-building and the role of private security companies.

I participated in the two final days of the week long program and gave a lecture on capacity building based on my article forthcoming in Global Affairs and on the Lessons Learned Paper I recently wrote on the issue. I especially stressed the importance for recognizing that capacity building is a contested term, that it has political effects and discussed the intricacies of ownership.