A breakthrough in the making?
Shifts in the Latin American drug policy debate
There is an undeniable regional trend of moving away from the ‘war on drugs’ in Latin America. This briefing explains the background, summarises the state of ongoing drug law reforms, and makes recommendations to move the debate forward.
The high expectations of a high-level debate on current drug policy regimes in the Americas at the sixth Organization of American States (OAS) Summit in April 2012, in Cartagena, Colombia, were quickly tempered to a general approval that the topic had been discussed at this level at all. The summit's outcome can be called both a failure and a success: no alternatives to prohibition were discussed, but all agreed that the effectiveness of current strategies should be looked into. The OAS was mandated to undertake a study and discuss the gathered evidence for more effective alternative strategies in 2013.
The International Conference of Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Heads of Specialized National Agencies against the World Drug Problem, in Lima on 25 and 26 of June, will be the next opportunity for high level policy makers to discuss both the content and form of this evaluation or study. Another opportunity arises concurrently on June 26, in New York, where there will be a thematic debate on 'Drugs and Crime as a Threat to Development' on the occasion of the UN International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, at the 66th Session of the United Nations General Assembly.
It was due to the insistence and efforts of Presidents Otto Pérez Molina (Guatemala) and Juan Manuel Santos (Colombia), and the extensive media attention in the run-up to the April Summit in Cartagena, that the issue was present at all on the agenda of the Summit. At last, some of the frustrations with U.S.-promoted drug control policies were on the table at the highest political level in the American hemisphere: the “genie was freed from the bottle”. Behind closed doors and for Presidents and heads of delegations only, the “hot but hidden” issue was discussed on the Sunday afternoon, in “an open and frank manner”, according to the host President Santos.
The emergence of an increasingly independent and assertive Latin America insisting on a change of direction in drug control policies reflects an important shift in its relationship with the United States. The demand for “democratization” of the debate and alternative policy options stems from the perception that Latin American societies pay a disproportionate price in lost lives, hijacked justice systems, abuses in overcrowded prisons, and displaced small farmers, because of the U.S.-led strategy that has prioritised stemming the supply of drugs over reducing its own demand. The U.S. Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control acknowledged as much in its latest report, saying that “the United States must do significantly more to reduce our country’s demand for illegal drugs.
Ultimately, it is drug consumption in the United States that fuels violence throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.” This is not to say that U.S. society hasn’t also paid a high price for repressive domestic drug law enforcement, in terms of drug-related violence and overcrowded prisons.
CONCLUSIONS & RECOMMENDATIONS
- Ensure that the OAS-mandated study on alternative drug policy options will be an honest and open-minded reflection on different models and strategies
- Support moves towards the legal regulation of the cannabis market and explore with a coalition of like-minded countries how best to resolve the legal conflict with the UN conventions • Elaborate substance-specific proposals for managing different drug submarkets
- Experiment with harm reduction policy measures to reduce the level of drug-related violence
- Support the legal right to coca chewing and allow a licit coca market to develop in the whole region
- Secure civil society participation in the debate on drug policy reform
- Challenge provisions in the UN conventions that are obstacles to advancing with evidence-based reforms.
About the authors
Amira Armenta
Amira Armenta (Colombia/Netherlands) has a degree in Latin American history from the Université de Jussieu (Paris).
Martin Jelsma
Martin Jelsma is a political scientist who has specialised in Latin America and international drugs policy. In 2005, he received the Alfred R. Lindesmith Award for Achievement in the Field of Scholarship, which stated that Jelsma "is increasingly recognized as one of, if not the, outstanding strategists in terms of how international institutions deal with drugs and drug policy."
In 1995 he initiated and has since co-oordinated TNI's Drugs & Democracy Programme which focuses on drugs and conflict studies with a focus on the Andean/Amazon region, Burma/Myanmar and Afghanistan, and on the analysis and dialogues around international drug policy making processes (with a special focus on the UN drug control system). Martin is a regular speaker at international policy conferences and advises various NGOs and government officials on developments in the drugs field. He is co-editor of the TNI Drugs & Conflict debate papers and the Drug Policy Briefing series.
Pien Metaal
Pien Metaal is a researcher with TNI. She holds a Master of Arts Degree in Political Science and International Relations from University of Amsterdam. She has been a member of the Transnational Institute's Drugs and Democracy team since 2002, though her participation with the Programme dates further back.
She lived in Latin America for several years, spending most of that time in the Andean region. During those years, she dedicated most of her time and energy to research, development and implementation of drug policy, particularly in relation to coca and cocaine, and worked with local and international experts and NGOs. She has written numerous articles, and contributed to various books and publications on the drug policy in Latin America since 1996.
Recent publications from Drugs and Democracy
Human rights and drug policyAn accessible but comprehensive primer on why TNI believes that human rights must be at the heart of any debate on drug control. |
Expert Seminar "Where next for Europe on drug policy reform?"Analysis of the new EU strategy on drugs and its action plan and discussion on ways to improve and innovate European drug policy. |
Working towards a legal coca marketModern use of the coca leaf in Argentina provides a series of examples that could contribute to dispelling many of the myths that have polarized debate about the subject over the last few years. |
Informal Drug Policy Dialogue 2013, WarsawThe tenth meeting of the Informal Drug Policy Dialogue series, organised by the Transnational Institute (TNI) and Association Diogenis, took place in Warsaw, Poland, gathering over 35 NGO representatives, academics, policy makers and practitioners. |
