Drug Prohibition

In school we are taught that prohibition collapsed in 1933. Yet 70 years later a new generation faces the same problem with mildly harmful substances being banned because the government does not trust people to make their own decisions.

Please read some of the stuff in the following links which provide an overwhelming case against drug prohibiiton. Then write to your your local senator or your MP

News and Views

• The medical effects of recreational drugs. Drugscope also have a lot of information.
• The Economist is a powerful advocate of drug legalisation. The editorial on July 26th 2001 considers both sides of the argument, and raises issues which society has to face during the legalisation process. The same issue has a survey which I strongly urge you to read.
• The libertarian side of the argument is given by Miron and Zwiebel, ``The Economic Case Against Drug Prohibition,'' Journal of Economic Perspectives, 9(4), Fall 1995, 175-192. JSTOR.
• Peter Reuter at the University of Maryland has several comprehensive studies of the drug industry.
• The Centre for Drug Research at the University of Amsterdam.
• The BBC and the The Guardian have drugs trade sites. Stories from around the world are covered by Cannabis News.

Institutions

• The Cannabis Coalition and Cures not Wars have regular marches.
• In the UK leading organisations include Drugscope, Transform, and Liberty.
• In the US Students for a Sensible Drug Policy petitions against funding cuts for students caught in possession.
• The Lindesmith Center and the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation are respectable drug campaigning organisations
• The November Coalition is a collection of normal, down to earth Americans who find the human cost of the current drug policy to be unbearable. The Wall is a moving account of some of the victims of the war on drugs. The Fortune Society works on behalf of ex-prisoners in the US.
• And the DEA Site. There must be a better way to spend $2bn a year.
• Law Enforcement Against Prohibition is a collection of policemen, judges and prison officers against prohibition.

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Date: August 2004