Superyachts

A superyacht is a boat that exceeds 30 metres in length, with some surpassing even 100 metres – more than a football field. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, there were about 2,000 of these vessels in the world; two decades and a financial crisis later, there are three times as many.

In Superyachts, Grégory Salle argues that these are not whimsical fads: on the contrary, luxury yachting highlights the social exclusivity of the wealthiest and the environmental waste they emit. Rather than being simply the plaything of billionaires with extravagant lifestyles, the superyacht offers a disconcerting reflection of the world as it is.

A contemporary form of ostentatious seclusion, a magnifying glass for social inequalities, the superyacht leads us straight to the great questions of our time, including the question of ecocide. From class struggle to the over-consumption of the rich, from tax evasion to environmental crime, from eco-bleaching to the differential management of illegalities, to pull the thread of super yachting is to unspool the whole ball of capitalism.

Table of Contents

• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations & acronyms
• Preface to the English edition
• 1. A colossus at anchor
• 2. One form of excess can conceal another
• 3. Floating palaces
• 4. Specimens
• 5. UHNWI
• 6. Yachting lifestyle
• 7. The abode of production
• 8. Amsterdam’s red party
• 9. ISF-IFI & Co.
• 10. Riding the financial storm
• 11. Conspicuous seclusion
• 12. The political geography of luxury sailing
• 13. Playing the eco-friendly card (greenwashing)
• 14. Posidonia
• 15. The Marine Observatory
• 16. At sea/in a meeting
• 17. Red-handed
• 18. When Capitalocene and eco-socialism take to the water…
• Notes and references

About the Author

Grégory Salle is a researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS).

Praise for Superyachts

“Synecdoche is when a part stands in for the whole, and no part better represents the rise of a reckless, self-indulgent and damaging global plutocracy than superyachts. Once a rarity, there are now more than 5,000 of these monstrous floating mega-mansions, busy destroying marine ecosystems, undermining local, national and international law, and massively avoiding taxes. Grégory Salle paints a vivid picture of how these superyachts – costing hundreds of millions to build and many millions every year to operate – are a concrete expression of the grotesqueries of our current social disorder.”
– Harvard University

“Superyachts offers a deep dive into the world of the wealthiest. It is also a great case study for green criminology. In this breathtaking – and often humorous – book, Grégory Salle shows how capitalism is definitely destroying the planet.”
– California State University