Drugs and Drug Policy: What Everyone Needs to Know?While there have always been norms and customs around the use of drugs, explicit public policies--regulations, taxes, and prohibitions--designed to control drug abuse are a more recent phenomenon. Those policies sometimes have terrible side-effects: most prominently the development of criminal enterprises dealing in forbidden (or untaxed) drugs and the use of the profits of drug-dealing to finance insurgency and terrorism. Neither a drug-free world nor a world of free drugs seems to be on offer, leaving citizens and officials to face the age-old problem: What are we going to do about drugs? In Drugs and Drug Policy, three noted authorities survey the subject with exceptional clarity, in this addition to the acclaimed series, What Everyone Needs to Know?. They begin, by defining "drugs," examining how they work in the brain, discussing the nature of addiction, and exploring the damage they do to users. The book moves on to policy, answering questions about legalization, the role of criminal prohibitions, and the relative legal tolerance for alcohol and tobacco. The authors then dissect the illicit trade, from street dealers to the flow of money to the effect of catching kingpins, and show the precise nature of the relationship between drugs and crime. They examine treatment, both its effectiveness and the role of public policy, and discuss the beneficial effects of some abusable substances. Finally they move outward to look at the role of drugs in our foreign policy, their relationship to terrorism, and the ugly politics that surround the issue. Crisp, clear, and comprehensive, this is a handy and up-to-date overview of one of the most pressing topics in today's world. What Everyone Needs to Know? is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press. |
Contents
Why Have Drug Laws? | |
Expand opiate substitution therapy 4 Push drug treatment providers toward the use of evidence based treatment practices and evidencebased manage... | |
Dont expect the police to eliminate mature markets 8 Use druglaw enforcement to reduce violence and disorder 9 Deemphasize international supply c... | |
Stop pretending alternative development is drug control 11 Use prevention programs that work The Pragmatist List 1 Be openminded about safer for... | |
Reduce the number of drug dealers behind bars 4 Explore the role of positive incentives in treatment 5 Do not reject all types of harm reduction just ... | |
Raise alcohol taxes 2 Ban alcohol sales to convicted drunken assailants and drunken drivers 3 Try to make getting drunk unfashionable 4 Create way... | |
Study the nonmedical benefits of psychoactive drugs and safer ways of using them 6 Keep raising cigarette taxes in lowtax states | |
How Do Drugs Work in the Brain? | |
Other editions - View all
Drugs and Drug Policy: What Everyone Needs to Know Mark A.R. Kleiman,Jonathan P. Caulkins,Angela Hawken No preview available - 2011 |
Common terms and phrases
abusable drugs addiction ADHD Afghanistan alcohol anabolic steroids availability behavior benefits benzodiazepines buprenorphine cannabis Caulkins chemicals chronic cigarettes clients clinics cocaine consumed consumption corruption cost countries crack create crime criminal crops damage decriminalization dependent users developed dose drink drinkers drug abuse drug control drug courts drug dealers drug dealing drug enforcement drug markets drug policy drug problems drug taking drug testing drug trafficking drug treatment drug users druglaw enforcement drugrelated enhance epidemic harm heroin heroin maintenance higher illegal drugs illicit drugs illicit markets incarceration increase Kleiman large number legalized drugs less marijuana Mark A. R. Mark A. R. Kleiman MDMA methamphetamine nicotine offenders opiate overdose percent prevention programs prison probationers production prohibition psychoactive psychoactive drugs quantity receptor result revenues risk selling side effects smoking social stimulants substance abuse substanceabuse disorders taxes terrorist tobacco treatmentdiversion Twelve Step programs typically United violence