Argentine Supreme Court to decriminalise drug possession today

So, in the same month that the UK Government is making political capital from attaching long prison sentences to several new drugs few people have even heard of, in a seemingly parallel universe not populated by drug warriors, other countries are queuing up to decriminalise personal possession of all drugs. Last week Mexico joined the growing list and today the Argentine Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling decriminalising drug possession for personal use.

The Court’s decision was based on a case brought by a 19 year-old who was arrested in the street for possession of two grams of cannabis. He was convicted and sentenced to a month and a half in prison, but challenged the constitutionality of the drug law based on Article 19 of the Argentine Constitution:

The private actions of men which in no way offend public order or morality, nor injure a third party, are only reserved to God and are exempted from the authority of judges. No inhabitant of the Nation shall be obliged to perform what the law does not demand nor deprived of what it does not prohibit.

Today, the Supreme Court ruled that personal drug consumption is covered by that privacy clause stipulated in Article 19 of the Constitution since it doesn’t affect third parties. Questions still remain, though, on the extent of the ruling. However, the government of President Cristina Fernández has fully endorsed the Court’s decision and has vowed to promptly submit a bill to Congress that would define the details of the decriminalization policies.

According to some reports, Brazil and Ecuador are considering similar steps.

The case has been under consideration by the high court for almost a year. The Argentine federal government has been reviewing its drug laws with an eye toward abandoning repressive policies toward users and is waiting for this case to be decided to move forward with new legislative proposals.

Supreme Court Justice Carlos Fayt told the Buenos Aires Herald that the court had reached a unanimous position on decriminalization, but declined to provide further details.

A positive Supreme Court decision on decriminalization would ratify a number of lower court decisions in recent years that have found that the use and possession of drugs without causing harm to others should not be a criminal offense.

see previous Transform blog coverage:

• Drug decriminlisation in Argentina? (April 08)
  

• Argentine president calls for decriminalisation of drug use (Aug 08)
  

related coverage:

• Mexico decriminalises personal drug possession

• Former Latin American presidents call for a paradigm shift

• Honduran president calls for legalisation of drugs

• Mexico's opposition calls for legalisation of drugs

further reading:

Drug policy reform in practice - useful new briefing from TNI on decriminlisation and other forms of reform in Europe and the America's

thanks to Stop the Drug War and Cato@Liberty

Mexico decriminalises personal drug possession

On Thursday Mexico finally enacted legislation to decriminalize personal possession of small quantities of all drugs (plans reported/discussed in more detail here back in May).

The legislation will operate in a somewhat similar fashion to the Portugese approach with arrested individuals having to agree to a drug treatment program to address admitted addiction or enter a prevention program designed for recreational users. penalties for those who refuse to attend one of these kinds of programs under the Mexican scheme have yet to be clarified.

The Mexican legislation defines threshold quantities of drugs under which which a designation of personal use can be made. These include 5 g of cannabis, or half 0.5g of cocaine, 50mg of heroin, LSD 0.015mg, and MDA/MDMA/methamphetamine all at 40mg (or 200mg for pills). Problems with such thresholds to make a distinction between possession for personal use and intent to supply offences have recently been discussed in a the context of UK legislation ( see appendix of this Transform briefing).

The response from the US has so far been somewhat muted, in stark contrast to the uproar that greeted similar proposals from the previous President Vincent Fox in 2006 , which were abandoned under extreme pressure from the Bush administration.

In many respects the legislation represents a formalisation of what was widespread tolerant policing practice - so may not have a huge impact on the ground.

Mexico joins a growing list of countries around the world that have either made similar moves or have them in the pipeline (see further reading below). Such moves - it is important to note - only address personal possession and use and do not involve decriminalisation or legalisation/regulation of drug production and supply which remains in the control of criminal enterprises. The UN treaties, whilst theoretically allowing moves towards decriminalising (or at least depenalising) personal use, specifically outlaw exploring options for legal regulation of production/supply. That said - there is an increasingly active debate in Latin America around such moves (see below).

For more details see this Associated Press report 20.08.09

Further reading

• Drug policy reform in practice - useful new briefing from TNI on decriminlisation and other forms of reform in Europe and the America's

• Former Latin American presidents call for a paradigm shift

• Argentine president calls for decriminalisation of drug use

• Honduran president calls for legalisation of drugs

• Mexico's opposition calls for legalisation of drugs
  

Baltimore police call for an end to the drug war

This is a short clip from MSNBC news, featuring interviews with the authors of a recent Washington Post article 'It's time to legalise drugs'; Peter Moskos, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the author of "Cop in the Hood", and Neill Franklin, a 32-year law enforcement veteran. Both served as Baltimore City police officers (home of 'The Wire') and are members of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.




from the Washington Post piece:

"Only after years of witnessing the ineffectiveness of drug policies -- and the disproportionate impact the drug war has on young black men -- have we and other police officers begun to question the system.

Cities and states license beer and tobacco sellers to control where, when and to whom drugs are sold. Ending Prohibition saved lives because it took gangsters out of the game. Regulated alcohol doesn't work perfectly, but it works well enough. Prescription drugs are regulated, and while there is a huge problem with abuse, at least a system of distribution involving doctors and pharmacists works without violence and high-volume incarceration. Regulating drugs would work similarly: not a cure-all, but a vast improvement on the status quo.

Legalization would not create a drug free-for-all. In fact, regulation reins in the mess we already have. If prohibition decreased drug use and drug arrests acted as a deterrent, America would not lead the world in illegal drug use and incarceration for drug crimes.

Drug manufacturing and distribution is too dangerous to remain in the hands of unregulated criminals. Drug distribution needs to be the combined responsibility of doctors, the government, and a legal and regulated free market. This simple step would quickly eliminate the greatest threat of violence: street-corner drug dealing.

We simply urge the federal government to retreat. Let cities and states (and, while we're at it, other countries) decide their own drug policies. Many would continue prohibition, but some would try something new. California and its medical marijuana dispensaries provide a good working example, warts and all, that legalized drug distribution does not cause the sky to fall.

Having fought the war on drugs, we know that ending the drug war is the right thing to do -- for all of us, especially taxpayers. While the financial benefits of drug legalization are not our main concern, they are substantial. In a July referendum, Oakland, Calif., voted to tax drug sales by a 4-to-1 margin. Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron estimates that ending the drug war would save $44 billion annually, with taxes bringing in an additional $33 billion.

Without the drug war, America's most decimated neighborhoods would have a chance to recover. Working people could sit on stoops, misguided youths wouldn't look up to criminals as role models, our overflowing prisons could hold real criminals, and -- most important to us -- more police officers wouldn't have to die."

A visual taxonomy of psychoactive drugs

This useful visual taxonomy of psychoactive drugs is from the brilliant Information is Beautiful blog (July 09). Click to see full resolution.

FT weekend magazine cover story: "Legalise the Lot"

We mentioned this excellent recent article by Mathew Engel in the Financial Times in the miniblog but I thought it was worth posting a scan* of the FT weekend magazine cover.




That this article appeared in the FT is significant given its readership and prestige within the media, and the fact that it made the magazine cover so prominently is testimony to how mainstream the reform arguments have become.



* sorry the scan is a bit rubbish - my only copy got a bit crumpled

Transform on Twitter

We have finally given in to the inevitable and set up shop on Twitter. You can find our twitter page here .



On top of any other pertinent 140 character drug policy musings we may have, the Transform blog and miniblog posts both automaticallyfeed directly into our Twitter. We will also be building up a collection of other interesting twitter activity to follow - so please post links below.

The US Government will to pay you to grow cannabis and roll joints for them.

The following announcement appeared on the US Government's Federal Business Opportunities website today:

Production, Analysis, & Distribution of Cannabis & Marijuana Cigarettes

Solicitation Number: N01DA-10-7773
Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Office: National Institutes of Health
Location: National Institute on Drug Abuse


Synopsis:
Added: Aug 05, 2009 9:03 am
The National Institute on Drug Abuse is soliciting proposals from qualified organizations having the capability to (1) grow, harvest, analyze, store and distribute GMP grade cannabis (marijuana) on large and small scales; (2) extract cannabis to obtain purified phytocannabinoids including delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (delta-9-THC), analyze, and store; (3) prepare marijuana cigarettes and related products; and (4) distribute marijuana, marijuana cigarettes and cannabinoids, and other related products for research and other Government programs upon NIDA authorization. Offeror must possess suitable and secure DEA approved outdoor and indoor growing facilities, research laboratory with appropriate analytical instruments, and experienced personnel to conduct the project tasks. Appropriate DEA approved secure facility for manufacturing of marijuana cigarettes, and their storage, and DEA Schedule I registration for marijuana and THC are essential. NIDA anticipates a 1-year with four 1 year options cost reimbursement type contract will be awarded. Additional quantity options for manufacturing cigarettes may also be required. In order to handle substances under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, it is mandatory that offerors possess a DEA Research Registration for Schedules II to V and demonstrate the capability to obtain a DEA registration for Schedule I controlled substances. All studies must be carried out under pertinent FDA regulations, such as current Good Clinical Practice (cGCP) and current Good Laboratory Practice (cGLP) regulations. The pertinent FDA's guidelines/guidance shall be followed. RFP No. N01DA-10-7773 will be available electronically on or about August 25, 2009. You can access the RFP through the FedBizOpps http://fbo.gov or through the NIDA website at the following address: http://www.nida.nih.gov/RFP/RFPList.html. The electronic RFP contains all information needed to submit a proposal. No printed version of the solicitation document or source list is available. NIDA will consider proposals submitted by any responsible offeror. Proposals will be due on or about October 9, 2009. This advertisement does not commit the Government to award a contract. Based upon market research, the Government is not using the policies contained in Part 12, Acquisition of Commercial Items, in its solicitation for the described supplies or services. However, interested persons may identify to the contracting officer their interest and capability to satisfy the Government's requirement with a commercial item within 15 days of this notice.

Contracting Office Address:
6101 Executive Boulevard
Room 260 - MSC 8402
Bethesda, Maryland 20892
Primary Point of Contact.:
Amy Sheib
ap370t@nih.gov

UKDPC calls for Tactical Strikes in the War on Drugs

In its report "Refocusing Drug-Related Law Enforcement to Address Harms" released today, the UKDPC suggests that we need to get smarter in focusing law enforcement to reduce the harms associated with illegal drugs and illegal drug markets.

In a report supported by both SOCA and ACPO, the main conclusions are:

• Enforcement has contained illegal drug supply, but more arrests and drug seizures do not always lead to lower availability or fewer problems.
• However, some innovative approaches have addressed the most harmful characteristics of entrenched drug markets e.g. violence/intimidation.
• New measures of impact are needed so operations are judged on real benefits to communities, not simply arrests and seizures.

The report suggests very clearly that there are ‘unintended consequences’ of enforcing the drug laws and quotes UNODC chief Antonia Maria Costa from his 2008 paper ‘Fit for Purpose’.

Transform welcomes the report for its clarity in showing that enforcement creates harm and for clearly calling for impact assessments of enforcement activity. As we explained in our recent meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, to be meaningful such an assessment must explore all the options.

However, it is Transform’s view that the UK’s domestic strategy on drugs is part of a global ‘war on drugs’, (despite the US Drug Czar and Roger Howard’s claims to the contrary). On the BBC news this morning Roger was at pains to explain that there is no ‘war on drugs’.

Here's the Drug Czar's quote:

"Regardless of how you try to explain to people it's a 'war on drugs' or a 'war on a product,' people see a war on them," he said; "We're not at war with people in this country."

Here's Roger's (BBC News): "You can't have a war against your own people and against your own citizens."

The fact is that states can (and do) indeed engage in drug wars against their own and other nations’ citizens. And therein lies the problem with the UKDPC report. Like the conclusion of the report from Costa, it effectively calls for ‘tactical strikes’ in the war on drugs, not an end to the war.

The ‘harms’ in the global drug war are the deaths and degradation of millions of the most marginalised people on earth, and it smacks of propaganda to even use the term ‘harms’. Tactical strikes to reduce damage to civilian bystanders is a nonsense when it is the drug control system itself and the enforcement of supply side laws that creates most of the trouble in the first place.

If we are to truly remove the ‘harms’ caused by the drug control system we do not need smarter weapons, we must end the war on drugs altogether, and replace it with a normative regime based upon human development, human security and human rights – the three pillars of the UN.

See also: Politics.co.uk on the UKDPC Report - with Transform quote

UKDPC Briefing Paper - Moving towards Real Impact Drug Enforcement

Narco Wars: Can the war be won? Video discussions

Last week Danny Kushlick, Mike Trace and David Raynes spoke at the Frontline Club to explore whether the war on drugs can be won.

You can watch the video here (sorry, the embed code doesn't seem to be working) Well worth a look to see the range of views

Danny also debated drug policy at the Cambridge Union in April this year, with Kathy Gyngell and Professor Neil MacKeganey.



Worth a look, to see Kathy and Neil try to defend the indefensible.

Home Office designates drug posession as 'victimless' crime

It is interesting that the Home Office Statistical Bulletin 'Crime in England and Wales
2008/09, Volume 1: Findings from the British Crime Survey and police recorded crime' published this week, notes (p.33):

"The BCS excludes.... those crimes termed as victimless (e.g. possession of drugs)"

'Victimless' is an interesting phrase, not one used in jurisprudence, that is essentially political - tending to be flagged up as part of moves towards criminal penalties being removed (it rather reminded me of the old 'no victim, no crime' cannabis campaign stickers). Its inclusion here perhaps reflects the wider trend towards acknowledging personal drug use is not rightly the subject of criminal sanction even if it is the subject of social or state disapproval in one form or other. This is more than a purely intellectual trend as actual or de-facto decriminalisation of personal possession and use of drugs taking place in much of Europe and around the world.

Where this leads intellectually is also an interesting question; if possession and consenting adult use is not criminal, what are the implications for commercial drug transactions between consenting adults, that also have no obvious victim? The statistical crime bulletin could very soon be largely just blank pages.

Transform submission to Consultation on Sentencing For Drug Offences

Last week we submitted our response to the Sentencing Advisory Panel's Consultation on Sentencing For Drug Offences. It asks some fundamental questions about the premises on which the recommendations for change are based. Read the full Transform submission here.

For useful companion documents see the detailed legal dissection and discussions, see Release's submission here and the UKDPC submission here.

Walter Cronkite, 1916-2009 'The Drug Dilema; War or Peace'

Walter Cronkite 'the most trusted man in America' 1916 -2009

Copied below is the epilogue by veteran newscaster Walter Cronkite, who died last week, at the close of "The Drug Dilemma: War or Peace," The Cronkite Report, June 20, 1995:

Every American was shocked when Robert McNamara, one of the master architects of the Vietnam war, acknowledged that not only did he believe the war was, "wrong, terribly wrong," but that he thought so at the very time he was helping to wage it. That's a mistake we must not make in this 10th year of America's all-out War on Drugs.

It's surely time for this nation to stop flying blind, stop accepting the assurances of politicians and other officials, that if we only keep doing what we are doing, add a little more cash, break down a few more doors, lock up a few more Jan Warrens and Nicole Richardsons, then we will see the light at the end of the tunnel. Victory will be ours.

Tonight we have seen a war that in its broad outline is not working. And we've seen some less war-like ideas that appear to hold promise. We've raised more questions than we've answered, because that's where the Drug War stands today. We're a confused people, desperately in need of answers and leadership. Legalization seems to many like too dangerous an experiment; to others, the War on Drugs, as it is now conducted, seems inhumane and too costly. Is there a middle ground?

Well, it seems to this reporter that the time has come for President Clinton to do what President Hoover did when prohibition was tearing the nation apart: appoint a bi-partisan commission of distinguished citizens, perhaps including some of the people we heard tonight, a blue-ribbon panel to re-appraise our drug policy right down to its very core, a commission with full investigative authority and the prestige and power to override bureaucratic concerns and political considerations.

Such a commission could help us focus our thinking, escape the cliches of the Drug War in favor of scientific fact, and more rationally analyze the real scope of the problem, answer the questions that bedevil us, and present a comprehensive drug policy for the future.

We cannot go into tomorrow with the same formulas that are failing today. We must not blindly add to the body count and the terrible cost of the War on Drugs, only to learn from another Robert McNamara 30 years from now that what we've been doing is, "wrong, terribly wrong."

Goodnight.

See Also:

Ethan Nadlemann on Alternet: Walter Cronkite Knew a Failed War When He Saw One: Vietnam and the War on Drugs

PM hears case for Impact Assessment of drug laws

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has held an important meeting with drugs policy campaigning group Transform, and Lembit Öpik, Liberal Democrat MP for Montgomeryshire to hear the case for an impact assessment of drug laws.

Danny Kushlick, Head of Policy and Communications at Transform Drug Policy Foundation said after the meeting:

"Impact assessment is a standard tool in Government for scrutinising policy and exploring alternative options that could achieve better outcomes. Our drug laws have not been assessed effectively since their enactment nearly forty years ago and the world is a very different place now."

"I am confident that over the coming months and years, the drug laws will receive the level of parliamentary scrutiny currently reserved for the introduction of new legislation. Impact assessment offers us all a major opportunity to reframe the drug policy debate in a less emotive and more productive manner."

"We are extremely grateful to the Prime Minister for considering our request. Mr. Brown was interested to hear about the 2003 No.10 Strategy Unit Report which he had not seen, which shows that supply side enforcement cannot work in the long term, and actually creates huge collateral damage."

Commenting after the meeting, Lembit Öpik said:

"While the Prime Minister didn't commit to implementing our request there and then, I am satisfied that he truly did listen. The impact assessment won't happen tomorrow, but this meeting is a start of a serious dialogue. We don't want to bully anyone into going along with this research - nor could we! But I'm confident that in the months ahead we will persuade the government that this is in everyone's interests, and I'm extremely grateful to the Prime Minister for holding this meeting to hear our case."

Lembit Öpik added: "Overall, the Prime Minister had a useful discussion with the delegation. No commitment has at this stage been made, but he clearly takes seriously any proposals which have the potential to help us address the misuse of drugs, and all the associated social and health costs which go with it."

Professor Richard Wilkinson, co-author of “The Spirit Level”, said;

"I support the Transform Drug Policy Foundation initiative and urge the government to undertake an impact assessment of the Misuse of Drugs Act."

ENDS

Notes to editors

1. An analysis of the 2003 No10 Strategy Unit Report can be read here

2. Richard Wilkinson is Emeritus Professor of Social Epidemiology at Nottingham University, author of 'Unequal societies; the afflictions of inequality', and co-author, with Kate Pickett, of ‘The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better’

3. Government guidelines on Impact Assessments are available here


Here is the briefing note that Transform gave to Mr Brown:

Towards Effective Drug Policy: Time for an Impact Assessment

Transform Drug Policy Foundation
Transform is a think-tank that campaigns for sustainable well being, promoting the replacement of prohibition with effective and humane systems to regulate drugs.

Recommendation
The UK Government should lead the world by carrying out an Impact Assessment (IA) of domestic drugs prohibition, starting with the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and related legislation. An IA should model all the alternatives including stepping up prohibition, Portuguese-style decriminalisation, and legal regulation. The EC and UN should undertake a similar exercise internationally to incorporate impacts on producer and transit countries, and ensure drug policy no longer undermines human development, human security and human rights.

Basis for recommendation

• Despite the billions spent each year, evidence from around the globe, (including the PM’s Strategy Unit Drugs Report of 2003 ) shows the prohibitionist approach to drugs has consistently delivered the opposite of its stated goals, with the poor and marginalised hit hardest.

• The Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime also admits the international drug control system has massive ‘unintended consequences’ including: creating a huge criminal market; displacing policy from health to enforcement; and geographical displacement (the ‘balloon effect’).

• At a time of economic stricture, it is crucial that drugs expenditure is cost-effective, with all potential alternatives meaningfully explored. Transform’s cost-benefit analysis (based on Government data) shows a move to legal regulation and control could:

o Save the UK billions of pounds to spend on other priorities
o Halve property crime and the prison population
o Remove a huge obstacle to development and security in Afghanistan and beyond

• Using Impact Assessment as a guiding tool would help end the emotive and polarised debate around drug policy reform, and enable politicians to genuinely engage with the search for better alternatives.

Appendix

Introduction
We all share the common goal of a drug policy that maximises environmental, physical, psychological and social wellbeing worldwide. Yet, whether viewed internationally or domestically, the prohibitionist approach has seen drug supply and availability increasing; use of drugs that cause the most harm increasing; health harms increasing; and massive levels of crime leading to a crisis in our criminal justice systems. Illicit drug profits are enriching criminals, fuelling conflict and undermining security and development in producer and transit countries from Mexico and Guinea Bissau, to Afghanistan and Colombia, with the gravest impacts falling upon the poor and marginalised.

Whilst the UNODC acknowledges the high costs of prohibition, it has so far neglected to count them, or model alternatives. Similarly, the Home Office acknowledges that legal regulation of drug markets would have benefits , but claims they would be outweighed by the costs. Yet no such cost-benefit analysis has ever been carried out in the UK, or anywhere else. Value for money studies commissioned in 2007 remain unpublished.

The UK could take the lead by carrying out an objective, independent, national assessment, comparing current policy with the alternatives; encourage other consumer, producer and transit countries to follow suit; and call for international assessments by the EC and UN.

A UK Impact Assessment
In the UK, drug legislation has changed little since the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act (MDA) which has for many years been colliding with dramatically changed circumstances, including a massive increase in the use of illegal drugs, and a correspondingly huge illegal market, compounded by globalisation. As a result, a root and branch review is long overdue, and an Impact Assessment of the MDA should form the first step in genuinely assessing the UK’s approach to drugs.

Through allowing the outcomes of any government intervention to be assessed against the goals it is supposed to meet, along with modelling alternatives, IA is a sophisticated tool to strengthen evidence-based policy-making, improve accountability and transparency, and enable more informed public and parliamentary debate. Typically IAs now consider the potential or actual impacts (positive and negative) of a policy in terms of the three pillars of sustainable development – economic, social and environmental.

An IA aimed at helping to deliver evidence-based policy - behind which all stakeholders can unite - would put all options on the table, without committing any stakeholder to a specific position: from stepping up prohibition, through decriminalisation, to legal regulation and control. In addition to current mechanisms for regulating the supply of legal drugs and intoxicants, there are a variety of existing approaches to dealing with illicit drugs. These include Portugal’s decriminalisation of possession of drugs since 2001 (widely hailed as a success, including by the UNODC), the long-term large-scale maintenance prescription of heroin in Switzerland, and the Netherlands ‘coffee-shop’ system for cannabis.

The application of IA for ex post evaluation of this kind has been less common than its use in ex ante assessment of proposed new measures. However, there is now recognition of the need for more evaluation work of this kind, for example in the European Commission work on IA.

When an entire UK Act is subject to Impact Assessment it is often broken down into smaller sections each of which has a separate IA. For example the Police and Crime Bill currently before Parliament has twenty separate IAs addressing different aspects.

The UNODC currently send out a biannual survey to member countries as part of its information gathering for the World Drug Report. Transform would like to see this include a template with questions for a country level IA, which could be collated as the basis for a global IA.

An Impact Assessment is Overdue
An IA of drug policy would be in line with Government guidelines. For example, the Treasury Green Book states that: "...no policy, programme or project is adopted without first having the answer to these questions: (1) Are there better ways to achieve this objective? (2) Are there better uses for these resources?"

More specifically, BERR IA guidelines say that all new legislation and policy changes with a cost or benefit to the public, private or third sectors greater than £5 million require the relevant government department to conduct an IA. This threshold has been crossed by many individual drug related interventions, and a number of other triggers have been pulled including: “When review leads to the identification of new policy challenges (perhaps arising from unintended consequences of the intervention itself), the [IA] process begins again."

Similarly, the National Audit Office 2001 guide ‘Modern Policymaking: Ensuring policies deliver value for money’ states: “Departments…need to review policies, for example to determine when the time is right to modify a policy in response to changing circumstances so that it remains relevant and cost effective; and departments may need to terminate policies if they are no longer cost effective or they are not delivering the policy outcomes intended.”

As previously noted there are huge unintended consequences of the current drug control system, and evidence shows the MDA is not delivering what it was supposed to - for example a twenty-fold increase in heroin use.

There is a UK precedent for using IA to compare prohibition with decriminalisation or legal regulation of drugs. The 2005 Drugs Act had an Impact Assessment of the proposal to make Magic Mushrooms a Class A drug, including the option of allowing licensed sales.

For too long the debate around drugs policy reform has been paralysed and polarised. An Impact Assessment offers an objective, independent and neutral tool for enabling key stakeholders to work together to create a drug policy fit for the 21st Century.

See also from the Transform blog:

• MP calls for Impact Assessment of drugs policy in prime ministers questions
  
  
• Transform publishes cost benefit analysis study of prohibition / regulation

World Drug Report Preface majors on legalisation

Below is the text from the Preface to World Drug Report 2009 - dominated by a detailed rebuttal of the growing calls for a debate on legal regulation of drug production and supply. We have deconstructed these kind of critiques so many times before, we won’t be doing it again here - other than to observe it is the same confused mix of misrepresentations, straw man arguments, and logical fallacies that we are used to hearing from the UNODC's drug warriors. The particularly strange thing here though is that some of the analysis of the problem, the critique at least, is actually fairly good - it's where it leads that is so extraordinary....

See previous for comprehensive deconstruction:

• UNODC mugged by reality
• UNintended Consequences - side effects and contra indications of global prohibition
  
• Fear prevails at the UN as voices for drug law reform are smeared
  
• UN bodies betray principles of peace by supporting the war on drugs
  
• Afghan Opium and the Emperor’s New Clothes
  
• The opium war's front line: Afghanistan, Iran and Hampshire
  
• UNODC director goes to Amsterdam: the lost report
  
• UNODC Director declares international drug control system is not ‘fit for purpose’
  
• UNODC director describes DPA event as '1000 lunatics', 'obviously on drugs'
  
• When all else fails: blame Amy Winehouse
  
• UNODC director (lamb) addresses the DPA (slaughter)
  
• UNODC ramps up the weird drug warrior rhetoric

Firstly, it might be useful to view this preface as a barometer of the debate globally, and of Transform and other reform NGOs having a real impact on the international debate at the highest levels, including the UNODC. It is a reflection of the progress the reform movement has made that the legalization/regulation issue takes up so much of the space in the preface, and that the UNODC feels the need to go on the defensive this prominently.

Secondly, we would suggest that it is indicative of an institutional problem at UNODC, that something as internally inconsistent as this passes muster and is allowed into the public domain. They fully acknowledge that prohibition, under the auspices of the UN drug agencies and international drug control infrastructure, has been a generational disaster on multiple fronts - and yet then call for more of the same, brushing off those who call for a debate on alternatives with the offensive and childish smear of being 'pro-drugs'. Costa has a seemingly unique politician's ability to be simultaneously insightful and manifestly wrong, demonstrating a similar trick with those who challenge him by being both conciliatory and offensive.

Thirdly and last, it is not all bad. The text makes clear reference to the need to address wellbeing:

“The problem can only be solved by addressing the problem of slums and dereliction in our cities, through renewal of infrastructures and investment in people – especially by assisting the youth, who are vulnerable to drugs and crime, with education, jobs and sport.” (our emphasis)

So if the only answer to drug misuse is to deal with the social problems that underlie it - where does that leave all that punitive enforcement?

Preface to World Drug Report 2009

The end of the first century of drug control (it all started in Shanghai in 1909) coincided with the closing of the UNGASS decade (launched in 1998 by a General Assembly Special Session on Drugs). These anniversaries stimulated reflection on the effectiveness, and the limitations, of drug policy. The review resulted in the reaffirmation that illicit drugs continue to pose a health danger to humanity. That’s why drugs are, and should remain, controlled. With this sanction in mind, Member States confirmed unequivocal support for the UN Conventions that have established the world drug control system.

At the same time, UNODC has highlighted some negative, obviously unintended effects of drug control, foreshadowing a needed debate about the ways and means to deal with them. Of late, there has been a limited but growing chorus among politicians, the press, and even in public opinion saying: drug control is not working. The broadcasting volume is still rising and the message spreading.

Much of this public debate is characterized by sweeping generalizations and simplistic solutions. Yet, the very heart of the discussion underlines the need to evaluate the effectiveness of the current approach. Having studied the issue on the basis of our data, UNODC has concluded that, while changes are needed, they should be in favour of different means to protect society against drugs, rather than by pursuing the different goal of abandoning such protection.

A. What’s the repeal debate about?

Several arguments have been put forward in favour of repealing drug controls, based on (i) economic, (ii) health, and (iii) security grounds, and a combination thereof.

I. The economic argument for drug legalization says: legalize drugs, and generate tax income. This argument is gaining favour, as national administrations seek new sources of revenue during the current economic crisis.

This legalize and tax argument is un-ethical and uneconomical. It proposes a perverse tax, generation upon generation, on marginalized cohorts (lost to addiction) to stimulate economic recovery. Are the partisans of this cause also in favour of legalizing and taxing other seemingly intractable crimes like human trafficking? Modern-day slaves (and there are millions of them) would surely generate good tax revenue to rescue failed banks.

The economic argument is also based on poor fiscal logic: any reduction in the cost of drug control (due to lower law enforcement expenditure) will be offset by much higher expenditure on public health (due to the surge of drug consumption). The moral of the story: don’t make wicked transactions legal just because they are hard to control.

II. Others have argued that, following legalization, a health threat (in the form of a drug epidemic) could be avoided by state regulation of the drug market. Again, this is naive and myopic. First, the tighter the controls (on anything), the bigger and the faster a parallel (criminal) market will emerge – thus invalidating the concept.

Second, only a few (rich) countries could afford such elaborate controls. What about the rest (the majority) of humanity? Why unleash a drug epidemic in the developing world for the sake of libertarian arguments made by a pro-drug lobby that has the luxury of access to drug treatment? Drugs are not harmful because they are controlled – they are controlled because they are harmful; and they do harm whether the addict is rich and beautiful, or poor and marginalized.

Drug statistics keep speaking loud and clear. Past runaway growth has flattened out and the drug crisis of the 1990s seems under control. This 2009 Report provides further evidence that drug cultivation (opium and coca) are flat or down. Most importantly, major markets for opiates (Europe and South East Asia), cocaine (North America), and cannabis (North America, Oceania and Europe) are in decline. The increase in consumption of synthetic stimulants, particularly in East Asia and the Middle East, is cause for concern, although use is declining in developed countries.

III. The most serious issue concerns organized crime. All market activity controlled by the authority generates parallel, illegal transactions, as stated above. Inevitably, drug controls have generated a criminal market of macro- economic dimensions that uses violence and corruption to mediate between demand and supply. Legalize drugs, and organized crime will lose its most profitable line of activity, critics therefore say.

Not so fast. UNODC is well aware of the threats posed by international drug mafias. Our estimates of the value of the drug market (in 2005) were ground-breaking. The Office was also first to ring the alarm bell on the threat of drug trafficking to countries in West and East Africa, the Caribbean, Central America and the Balkans. In doing so we have highlighted the security menace posed by organized crime, a matter now periodically addressed by the UN Security Council.

Having started this drugs/crime debate, and having pondered it extensively, we have concluded that these drug-related, organized crime arguments are valid. They must be addressed. I urge governments to recalibrate the policy mix, without delay, in the direction of more controls on crime, without fewer controls on drugs. In other words, while the crime argument is right, the conclusions reached by its proponents are flawed.

Why? Because we are not counting beans here: we are counting lives. Economic policy is the art of counting beans (money) and handling trade-offs: inflation vs. employment, consumption vs. savings, internal vs. external balances. Lives are different. If we start trading them off, we end up violating somebody’s human rights. There cannot be exchanges, no quid-pro-quos, when health and security are at stake: modern society must, and can, protect both these assets with unmitigated determination.

I appeal to the heroic partisans of the human rights cause worldwide, to help UNODC promote the right to health of drug addicts: they must be assisted and reintegrated into society. Addiction is a health condition and those affected by it should not be imprisoned, shot-at or, as suggested by the proponent of this argument, traded off in order to reduce the security threat posed by international mafias. Of course, the latter must be addressed, and below is our advice.

B. A better policy mix

The crime/drugs nexus was the subject of a Report entitled Organized Crime and its Threat to Security: tackling a disturbing consequence of drug control1 that I presented to the Commission on Narcotic Drugs and the Crime Commission in 2009. Because of the importance of this subject, we have devoted the thematic chapter of this year’s Report to examining further the issue and its policy implications. Here are some of the main points.

First, law enforcement should shift its focus from drug users to drug traffickers. Drug addiction is a health condition: people who take drugs need medical help, not criminal retribution. Attention must be devoted to heavy drug users. They consume the most drugs, cause the greatest harm to themselves and society – and generate the most income to drug mafias. Drug courts and medical assistance are more likely to build healthier and safer societies than incarceration. I appeal to Member States to pursue the goal of universal access to drug treatment as a commitment to save lives and reduce drug demand: the fall of supply, and associated crime revenues, will follow. Let’s progress towards this goal in the years ahead, and then assess its beneficial impact on the next occasion Member States will meet to review the effectiveness of drug policy (2015).

Second, we must put an end to the tragedy of cities out of control. Drug deals, like other crimes, take place mostly in urban settings controlled by criminal groups. This problem will worsen in the mega-cities of the future, if governance does not keep pace with urbanization.

Yet, arresting individuals and seizing drugs for their personal use is like pulling weeds – it needs to be done again the next day. The problem can only be solved by addressing the problem of slums and dereliction in our cities, through renewal of infrastructures and investment in people – especially by assisting the youth, who are vulnerable to drugs and crime, with education, jobs and sport. Ghettos do not create junkies and the jobless: it is often the other way around. And in the process mafias thrive.

Third, and this is the most important point, governments must make use, individually and collectively, of the international agreements against uncivil society. This means to ratify and apply the UN Conventions against Organized Crime (TOC) and against Corruption (CAC), and related protocols against the trafficking of people, arms and migrants. So far, the international community has not taken these international obligations seriously. While slum dwellers suffer, Africa is under attack, drug cartels threaten Latin America, and mafias penetrate bankrupt financial institutions, junior negotiators at these Conventions’ Conferences of the Parties have been arguing about bureaucratic processes and arcane notions of inclusiveness, ownership, comprehensiveness, and non-ranking. There are large gaps in the implementation of the Palermo and the Merida Conventions, years after their entry into force, to the point that a number of countries now face a crime situation largely caused by their own choice. This is bad enough.

Worse is the fact that, quite often vulnerable neighbors pay an even greater price. There is much more our countries can do to face the brutal force of organized crime: the context within which mafias operate must also be addressed.

•• Money-laundering is rampant and practically unopposed, at a time when interbank-lending has dried up.

The recommendations devised to prevent the use of financial institutions to launder criminal money, today are honored mostly in the breach. At a time of major bank failures, money doesn’t smell, bankers seem to believe. Honest citizens, struggling in a time of economic hardship, wonder why the proceeds of crime – turned into ostentatious real estate, cars, boats and planes – are not seized.

•• Another context deserving attention concerns one of humanity’s biggest assets, the internet. It has changed our life, especially the way we conduct business, communication, research and entertainment. But the web has also been turned into a weapon of mass destruction by criminals (and terrorists). Surprisingly, and despite the current crime wave, calls for new international arrangements against money-laundering and cyber-crime remain un-answered. In the process, drug policy gets the blame and is subverted.

C. A double “NO”

To conclude, transnational organized crime will never be stopped by drug legalization. Mafias coffers are equally nourished by the trafficking of arms, people and their organs, by counterfeiting and smuggling, racketeering and loan-sharking, kidnapping and piracy, and by violence against the environment (illegal logging, dumping of toxic waste, etc). The drug/crime trade-off argument, debated above, is no other than the pursuit of the old drug legalization agenda, persistently advocated by the pro-drug-lobby (Note that the partisans of this argument would not extend it to guns whose control – they say – should actually be enforced and extended: namely, no to guns, yes to drugs).

So far the drug legalization agenda has been opposed fiercely, and successfully, by the majority of our society. Yet, anti-crime policy must change. It is no longer sufficient to say: no to drugs. We have to state an equally vehement: no to crime.

There is no alternative to improving both security and health. The termination of drug control would be an epic mistake. Equally catastrophic is the current disregard of the security threat posed by organized crime.

Antonio Maria Costa
Executive Director
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

Updates and further info:

25.06.09

17.00
Transform quoted in the Guardian coverage: UN report shows fall in opium and cocaine production

18.30
Law Enforcement Against Prohibition have issued a press statement and
have launched a letter writing campaign in response to the UNODC arguments.

UN Office on Drugs and Crime admits it is at war with itself

News release

24th June 2009

The World Drug Report 2009, the flagship annual publication of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), will be launched in Washington DC on 24 June. Launched in the run up to World Drug Day on 26th June, the report provides detailed descriptions of trends in world drug markets. The report is likely to repeat the fact that the drug control system creates huge unintended consequences.

Transform, an NGO with special consultative status with the UN, argues that it is the regime of global prohibition that has created and compounded what is generally thought of as the ‘drug problem’, and that the UNODC is in agreement about the problem, if not the solution. Transform argues that the war on drugs must be ended to enable legally regulated drug markets to be established .

Even the UNODC website admits:

“Global drug control efforts have had a dramatic unintended consequence: a criminal black market of staggering proportions. Organized crime is a threat to security. Criminal organizations have the power to destabilize society and Governments. The illicit drug business is worth billions of dollars a year, part of which is used to corrupt government officials and to poison economies.

Drug cartels are spreading violence in Central America, Mexico and the Caribbean. West Africa is under attack from narco-trafficking. Collusion between insurgents and criminal groups threatens the stability of West Asia, the Andes and parts of Africa, fuelling the trade in smuggled weapons, the plunder of natural resources and piracy.”

The World Drug Report has long been criticised as attempting to dress up the long-term systemic failure of the international drug control system as success, and for ignoring some of the system’s most catastrophic failings. Despite the ongoing attempts to put a positive spin on the data there is no hiding from the reality that the era of global drug prohibition, enshrined in the three UN drug conventions (1961, 1971 and 1988), has witnessed a consistent escalation in harms associated with illicit drug production, supply and use.

Not only has the international drug control infrastructure – by its own measures – consistently delivered the opposite of its stated aims (the creation of ‘a drug free world’ being further away than ever) but, as Antonio Costa (UNODC executive director) has repeatedly stated, it has created a series of disastrous ‘unintended consequences’. Costa describes how the drug control system that his office oversees has created the ‘huge criminal black market’ that turns over in excess of £160 billion a year that has devastated producer and transit countries, has displaced policy ‘from public health to enforcement’ and caused the ‘balloon effect’ in which the problem is not eliminated but merely moved from one region to another.

Indeed the UN drug agencies are increasingly isolated from the UN family and at odds with the principles and practices of other UN agencies, whose work is built upon the pillars of human security, human development and human rights. Illustrating the point, a World Health Organisation report stated only last week that:

“The first two [drug] conventions predate the HIV/AIDS epidemic, while the third one predates the explosive global growth of injection drug use. Hence, while they benefit from considerable international support, these conventions my need to be revised today because some of their provisions affect the control of the HIV epidemic.”

Danny Kushlick, Head of Policy at Transform said:

“UNODC is officially at war with itself. The Executive Director has admitted repeatedly that the UNODC oversees the very system that gifts the vast illegal drug market to violent criminal profiteers, with disastrous consequences. The UNODC is effectively creating the problem it is claiming to eliminate. Mr Costa has identified five major ‘unintended consequences’ of the drug control system. Is there a time limit on how long a consequence remains ‘unintended’? Aren’t they now just ‘consequences’?”

“On the supply side fragile states like Afghanistan, Colombia and Guinea Bissau are drawn deeper into the illegal market where their profound underlying social and economic problems are compounded. Whilst for the rich consumer countries, like the US and UK, the illicit nature of trade is a catalyst for drug dealing and turf war violence, with the collateral damage inflicted on their more vulnerable neighbours, such as Mexico.”

He concluded:

“Only by ending our politically driven war on drugs can we hope to address the underlying sickness of producer, transit and consumer countries alike. In the short term, the UN and its member states should be obliged to conduct transparent impact assessments of their continued commitment to the Conventions with a view to acting on the evidence that they garner. In the longer term, the conventions need to be adapted, specifically allowing the flexibility for states, should they democratically decide, to explore legal regulation of drug production and supply. Until then the conventions will continue to undermine development, security and human rights.”

ENDS

Contact:

• Danny Kushlick, Head of Policy and Communications 07970 174747
• Steve Rolles, Head of Research 07980 213943

Notes for Editors:

• Transform is an NGO with UN ECOSOC special consultative status
• The WHO report quoted above is the 2009 Asia Pacific Report: ’Assessment of compulsory treatment of people who use drugs in Cambodia, China, Malaysia and Viet Nam: An application of selected human rights principles’
• The Costa quotes about unintended consequences come from the UNODC report "Making drug control 'fit for purpose': Building on the UNGASS decade

Updates 25.06.09:

17.00
Transform quoted in the Guardian coverage: UN report shows fall in opium and cocaine production