The Honor Frost Foundation sponsored a session, 'Maritime Archaeology, Capacity Building and Training in the Developing World' at the Sixth International Congress on Underwater Archaeology (IKUWA VI) held in Freemantle, Australia, in November 2016, dedicated to capacity development in the context of maritime archaeology. The papers presented in this special issue of this journal represent an attempt to understand different approaches to capacity building and development within the sphere of maritime cultural heritage. This paper, by way of an introduction to the subject, and this special issue, aims to explore the nature of capacity building and development in relation to maritime cultural heritage.