IS DRUG CONTROL AN INSTITUTIONAL OR A POLITICAL PROBLEM?
Francisco Thoumi
−ABSTRACT−
In Colombia it is pretty obvious for a lot of people that psychoactive
drugs would not be produced where there not a demand. In the United States it is also obvious for a
lot of people that if there were no offer, drugs would not be consumed. Basically, both points of view are valid. In
both countries, these statements allow people to place the blame for drug production,
traffic, and use abroad thus exporting responsibility and avoiding the need to
explore the internal and institutional causes of
supply
and demand.
The main drug-producing countries have very special
characteristics. All of them are
countries where drug laws are not enforced.
The causes for this are manifold: collapsed states which do not control
the whole of their territory, or which have weak or inoperative legal systems; countries
with minorities which have been and are exploited and economically and
politically excluded, or with minorities which have preserved their autonomy from
central power and have no loyalty to the nation; countries where subversive groups
use drugs to finance themselves; countries where society is tolerant towards
certain deviant behaviors.
All
of these characteristics are of an institutional nature; that is to say, that
they are tied to social control over behavior and the values generated by each
one of the societies. Colombia exhibits
an extreme individualism and a conjunction of the above mentioned
characteristics. Colombia has institutional and deep-seated values’ problems
which need to be corrected with or without drugs.
One
could elaborate a similar argument regarding drug use. Drug use has always
existed and will continue to do so. Controls, however, have always been social
not governmental. It is only when these
controls disappear that people seek for the state to exercise
control, even if it is mainly inefficient at doing so. Drug production, traffic
and use arise when social controls are weakened. For this reason, the problem is not one of
policies but of institutions and values. Repressive policies and alternative
development are designed mainly with the aim of making this activity less
profitable in absolute or relative terms but rarely do these policies take
institutional problems into consideration. This is why, in the best of cases,
these policies occasionally arrive at temporary successes and, in many cases,
what they do is hinder the achievement of long-term success; as in the case of
fumigation. If, in order to solve the long-term problem, a feeling of
pertaining and loyalty to the nation has to be first attained, then state
presence through fumigation is not one of the best means.
Liberalism
has been criticized in this forum. Nonetheless it seems strange that
neoliberalism's critics seek an ideal world where neoliberal policies are not
allowed, with the exception of those related to illegal drugs. The problem is not liberalism per se
but one of concentration of richness and power.
Drug legalization is put forth as a solution. If by legalization we understand a free and
neoliberal market where each person can produce, commerce and consume whatever
drugs he so desires, this will not occur; at least not during my lifetime nor
that of my children.
Translated from Spanish by MM Moreno,
Mama Coca www.mamacoca.org