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Latin Americans Ditch US 'War on Drugs'
Mexico and Argentina move towards decriminalising drugs
Argentina and Mexico have taken significant steps towards decriminalising drugs amid a growing Latin American backlash against the US-sponsored "war on drugs".
A soldier gestures as he gives instructions to a resident at a checkpoint in a neighbourhood of the border city of Ciudad Juarez April 20, 2009. A massive security crackdown has reduced killings in Ciudad Juarez, on the U.S. border, but the military occupation is beginning to chafe with residents, threatening support for President Felipe Calderon's war on drug cartels. Out of control violence has led Argentina and Mexico to take significant steps towards decriminalising drugs amid a growing Latin American backlash against the US-sponsored "war on drugs". Picture taken April 20, 2009. (REUTERS/Alejandro Bringas) Argentina's
supreme court has ruled it unconstitutional to punish people for using
marijuana for personal consumption, an eagerly awaited judgment that
gave the government the green light to push for further liberalisation.
It followed Mexico's decision to stop prosecuting people for possession of relatively small quantities of marijuana, cocaine, heroin and other drugs. Instead, they will be referred to clinics and treated as patients, not criminals.
Brazil and Ecuador are also considering partial decriminalisation as part of a regional swing away from a decades-old policy of crackdowns still favoured by Washington.
"The tide is clearly turning. The 'war on drugs' strategy has failed," Fernando Henrique Cardoso, a former Brazilian president, told the Guardian. Earlier this year, he and two former presidents of Colombia and Mexico published a landmark report calling for a new departure.
"The report of the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy has certainly helped to open up the debate about more humane and efficient policies. But, most of all, the facts are speaking by themselves," said Cardoso.
Reform campaigners have long argued that criminalisation enriched drug cartels, fuelled savage turf wars, corrupted state institutions and filled prisons with addicts who presented no real threat to society.
The US used its considerable influence to keep Latin America and the UN wedded to hardline policies which kept the focus on interdictions and jail sentences for consumers as well as dealers. The "war" was first declared by the Nixon administration.
The economic and social cost, plus European moves towards liberalisation, have emboldened some Latin American states to try new approaches.
Argentina's supreme court, presented with a case about youths arrested with a few joints, ruled last week that such behaviour did not violate the constitution. "Each adult is free to make lifestyle decisions without the intervention of the state," it said.
The government, which favours decriminalisation, is expected to amend laws in light of the ruling. The court stressed, however, that it was not approving complete decriminalisation, a move that would be fiercely resisted by the Catholic church and other groups.
The previous week the government of Mexico, which has endured horrific drug-related violence, made it no longer an offence to possess 0.5g of cocaine (the equivalent of about four lines), 5g of marijuana (about four joints), 50mg of heroin and 40mg of methamphetamine.
Three years ago, Mexico backtracked on similar legislation after the initiative triggered howls of outrage in the US and predictions that Cancún and other resorts would become world centres of narcotics tourism.
Now, however, the authorities quietly say they need to free up resources and jail space for a military-led war on the drug cartels, even while publicly justifying that offensive to the Mexican public with the slogan "to stop the drugs reaching your children". They also argue corrupt police officers will be deterred from extorting money from drug users.
Washington did not protest against the announcement, which was kept deliberately low key. "They made no fanfare so as not to arouse the ire of the US," said Walter McKay, of the Mexico City-based Institute for Security and Democracy. "I predict that when the US sees its nightmare has not come true and that there is no narco-tourist boom it will come under more pressure to legalise or decriminalise."
Some US states have decriminalised the possession of small amounts of marijuana and the Obama administration has emphasised public health solutions to drug abuse, giving Latin America more breathing room, said Kasia Malinowska-Sempruch, director of the Global Drug Policy Programme. "My hope is that Latin America will be the next region, after most of Europe, where evidence and science will be the basis for policy-making."
Argentina and Mexico's moves may encourage other governments to follow suit. A new law has been mooted in Ecuador, where President Rafael Correa last year pardoned 1,500 "mules" who had been sentenced to jail. His late father was a convicted mule.
Brazil's supreme court, as well as elements in Congress and the justice ministry, favour decriminalising possession of small quantities of drugs, said Maria Lúcia Karam, a former judge who has joined the advocacy group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.
She welcomed the moves towards decriminalisation but said repression remained a cornerstone of drug policy. "Unfortunately the 'war on drugs' mentality is still the dominant policy approach in Latin America. The only way to reduce violence in Mexico, Brazil or anywhere else is to legalise the production, supply and consumption of all drugs."
63 Comments so far
Show AllIf we stop the War on Drugs, how will all of our corrupt DEA agents make their million$ in tax-free benefits?
Plus staying high off of the confiscated goods.
Maybe this can be the wedge that undercuts American domination of Latin American countries in favor of our own corporate and/or security issues. Maybe we can even come to understand that leaders like Chavez and Morales are not our enemies, but rather seekers of freedom and justice for their people and that we should be supporting them.
We have absolutely no business building military bases in other countries (and whole continents like South America and, next, Africa) and fighting various Wars Against .... on their soil unless we have been expressly invited to do so.
Even if you have been invited to do so by corrupt little narco-paras like Uribe who want to get their cut even before the troops and materiel hit the ground, you have no business there.
The leadership of Argentina shouldn't be so concerned about the reactions of the Catholic church to decriminalization. What, is the Inquisition still in charge there?
Well they are in Honduras, for the Catholic Church was instrumental in helping the U.S. replace social democracy with a coup dictatorship. And you can always spot a capitalist priest, just look at their luxury set of wheels.
I think you're right, but there are some rebellious elements within the Catholic church in Honduras, who call for resistance to the coup government, and even insurrection against it, including a Padre Fausto Milla in Santa Rosa de Copan.
Not to mention their arrogant air of superiority. The Catholic Church might not have invented elitism, but it has perfected it.
The war on drugs is a misnomer. The only war is for control of the drugs. There is no "good" guys or "bad" guys in this so called war; only who gets to control the $$$$!
Drug war is high art in Brazil - it is unlikely that this excuse to take down players who dont pay up will stop any time soon. Enforcement of drug laws is, in Latin America and the US, enforcement of the staus quo - and internal state sponsored terrorism (defined as having three stages - intimidation, forced conversion, and genocide). Drug war is not about drugs - it is about power, and who shall have it.
Good comment. May I add that the decriminalization of all drugs would help take power from governments and restore power to the people---and cut crime and the prison population in half?
Right on, for the War on Terrorism is a war between the rich and the poor, with us being forced to save the filthy rich by fighting a filthy war.
Drug wars are about money.
Capitalist Republic -- On to a social democracy
Before we can get healthcare for all, which is charity for the poor healthcare, which is socialist healthcare, we first need to abolish our capitalist Republic.
For a capitalist Republic, like our Republic of 1776, is the unregulated freedom to compete for excessive wealth. The reverse of equality and the total destruction of democracy.
Whereas social democracy is the freedom to not compete, and in so doing to have equal wealth. Such as Venezuela since President Hugo Chávez took office, for Chávez has put into place nation healthcare for all and reduced poverty by 30%. For most in Venezuela predict that his goal to eliminate all poverty will be reached in our lifetime.
For our capitalist Republic has just installed a coup dictatorship in Honduras, doubled its military power in Columbia, and knows full well that if it does not destroy social democracy in Venezuela, then such a good example would surely destroy it, and capitalism along with it.
All propaganda to the contrary, the US is rapidly becoming the most backward country in the Western Hemisphere.
Maybe the ruling class thinks allowing a black man to be president will prove to everyone we are progressive, and they can take still more power from us without our noticing.
Not only is this war for power not about drugs, it's not about getting tough on crime.
This power grab has connections everywhere and it's main tool is "WE ARE TOUGH". Tough tough tough.
This is real life, not a gangster movie. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to throw in a little compassion? Maybe a little rational thought wouldn't hurt either.
This story has easily to be the best news of the day, as is other news coming out of Latin America (if you can find it---our media doesn't like to report it; notice how this one was from a UK newspaper) like the continued public resistance to the coup in Honduras which survives despite the best effort of the regime and its U.S. enablers to squelch it. See Narco News for this story. I think Latin America has given up on any revival of U.S. "good neighbor policy" and has gone for the saying that "good fences make good neighbors" where they and the U.S. are concerned.
WAR ON DRUGS -- WAR ON LABORING MEN
And surely a police state for laboring men. For all of law enforcement is of the intelligent middleclass and they spend 95% of their time policing laboring men.
Result being that 95% of prisoners in our jails prisons and insane asylums are laboring men. Accumulated result being that Empire USA with only 5% of world population how feeds, cloths, houses and provides crappy medical care for over 25% of all prisoners on earth.
Well said. And while they do all our work for us they get called names, the most unconscionable of all is 'lazy'.
Who among us is so much better than somebody else that they can justly put somebody else in a cage?
Maybe one in a thousand, definitely not one in a hundred.
"It followed Mexico's decision to stop prosecuting people for possession of relatively small quantities of marijuana, cocaine, heroin and other drugs. Instead, they will be referred to clinics and treated as patients, not criminals."
Here in Mexico the gov. keeps prosecuting people for possession of any quantity of drugs, while a law did pass through the chamber of Deputies and the Senate it was sent to the president for him to either veto or accept it and order the Official Newspaper of the Federation to print it and hence come into effect, the president hasnt done neither so the new "law" is still not valid. Nice "reporting" by the Guardian...
President Calderon has made the war on some drugs (its users really) a pillar of his fragile hold on power and isnt likely at all to pursuit any change in the current state of affairs, addiction to power is very strong in all politicians going cold turkey in it is harder than kicking alcohol and nicotine at the same time and war on a concept can be very profitable to the organized crime burecrauts and private sector as well. Real change will come from the users not the garbage that rules us.
Earth desperately needs ALL drugs and pschedelics especially to be legal and tax free (no way im paying drug taxes after the pigs in power have been using what WE pay to instill so much sufffering in persons and countries), humankind is sick and it needs medicine to heal itself and give way to a true revolution of the conscience.
Peace.
Thank you for saying in that last paragraph what nobody else here on CD apparently has the guts to say.
I think many here on CD just assume that all drugs should be legal and even non-taxed. I mean, it doesn't take a rocket scientist---
Glad to see someone else posting from Mexico.
You are absolutely correct that Calderon has based his continuation in power on having the army out raping and pillaging in the name of the War on Drugs--scaring the shit out of the voters is his strategy, which so far has backfired to the point that the PRI is back in the saddle and there will be only 3 more years of the fascist PAN.
The War on Drugs here was another way to get US taxpayers' dollars, too--to buy more repressive military material with which to keep the angry and hungrier by the day mobs in their place.
And by mobs, I mean the pueblo--not the narcos who after all have run this country in partnership with the polls for at least 20 years.
Thanks for correcting the Guardian "mistake".
CD often posts articles from this POS rag.
The Guardian gives progressive's bad data because their loser journalists can't be bothered to do any investigative research other than reading one or two uninformed fringe blogs.
In the late 60s, the U.S. was the biggest influence around the world, pushing governments to ban drugs!
It went along the same lines as "if a terrorist resides in your country, we consider your country a terrorist country".
Are we fed up with our oppression yet?
-30-
reposting as an experiment, as my first try disappeared...
marijuana is wonderful...use it often...
haven't done cocaine for years...never saw much in it...
never did heroin...warned away from it by 'user' friends...
quit alcohol and tobacco 10 years ago...only bad there...
these are personal choices, as they should be...
the 'law' has no place here...
I agree wholeheartedly with your assessment of the Good Herb :) It's far better than any legal vice out there, and other than the danger posed by gung-ho cops arresting you for your bag and bowl, far less dangerous than any of the other illegal substances you mention.
Consider this: isn't it amazing how the party of "small government" and "no government interference" is so hellbent on prosecuting and persecuting us tokers?
Yet more "conservative" hypocrisy at play for ya :)
The party you mention appeals to uptight morons who can't think for themselves and use greed as a motivating force. Of course they can't stand marijuana. It's not that it's more dangerous as far as driving is concerned, it's that it's liberating and tends to promote 'free' thinking. If mankind had never figured out how to ferment grains and grapes and had consumed marijuana instead, the world would probably be a much more pleasant place.
I strongly favor decriminalization of all drugs. I also favor the death penalty for making drugs like methamphetamine. I was a teacher in an alternative high school for at risk kids. Some kids can smoke weed and it truly helps them. Many kids smoke weed and become incapable of mental activity. It is not the same for everybody. It affects us all differently. And the use of weed among children with developing brains [which take until early twenties to fully develop] inhibits the growth of the myelin sheath, which allows maximum use of the dendritic connections between neurons. Meth is another question. Meth kills brains, destroys bodies, just flat kills. It is a hideous habit, which is mostly terminal. Sorry, folks , but it is not all good stuff. Nothing wrong with an adult using mj, but there is a LOT wrong with kids using it. Decriminalize, yes. But death penalty for those pushing ANY drugs to children. I have personally witnessed far too much horror as a result of this stuff. It is also true that decriminalization will reduce drug use in america, as it has elsewhere. Take away the forbidden aspect and it loses some of its allure. I do not use weed or any of the others. That is because I just don't like the stuff. {Yes, I do like good ales and wines, and often make my own ales.} But I will try to protect your right to use it. If you are over 25, that is ....
That being said, all the comments herein concerning our country using the war on drugs to push other agendas, while the upper level agents get rich off it, are probably mostly true. Cheers for the Latin Americans, who are exhibiting the very best in political acumen in the world today. Latin America is the hope of the future. If we have one ....
MichaelC
How about the cost of alcholism? How may folks have been killed by people high on MJ as opposed to killed by drunk drivers?
A bit farcial to put folks in jail for having a few ounces of MJ, but its OK to go out falling down drunk......a bit of sanity is needed.
How many party-hearty college students have drunk themselves to death, vs how many have ever died from smoking herb???
And the Cdn gov't wants to impose manditory minimums for drug offences, trust harper to go off in the opposite direction...
Saturnalia,
Harper is a card-carrying rapture supporting Evangelical Right-Wing Fundamentalist, as are a fair number of his ministers. e.g the science minister who can't tell the difference between adaption and modification through descent. A creationist science minister who doesn't believe in evolution, can you imagine?
Harper himself believes he has a special part to play in Armageddon and that it will start with him in Canada.
Dare I say wishful thinking, delusion and let's hope he doesn't get the chance to deliver any self-fulfilling prophecies?
Canada is an international laughing stock with these buffoons.
Harper has a long way to go to match the incompetency of George Bush. Alas, Harper is still in power. Tell me again, how did he get elected?
Tell you what, I invite all independent-thinking, progressive Canadians to the US, and we'll send you all our lizard people. Then we'll build a wall along the 49th parallel, in the interests of national security, y'know.
Actually Stevie's religious beliefs are for show, (much like bush's were) he was a member of the united church when my father hired him for his first job at Imperial Oil back in the 1970s. (his father was a senior VP of the company, yet stevie still argues that he got to where he is without using nepotism...) Actually, back then Stevie was a staunch supporter of PE Trudeau, he thought the man was great; then stevie went to the university of Calgary. His minister's are certainly idiots from what I've read, although to be fair, they too might be pulling an act to distract us from their corporatist friendly ideology.
No matter how they try to spin it, we're captive to the gangster-politician-CEO axis of evil. The "War on Drugs" is one place where the nexus can be closely observed.
Gangsters control the supply from farm to street corner. Politicians write the laws that make certain substances artificially far more expensive than their cost to produce + reasonable profit. And CEOs of major banking/brokerage houses are happy to launder the approximately $500 billion/year generated by the drug trade.
Legalization, like single-payer health care, is the obvious solution; and for the same reasons of preserving extant business relationships, neither has a snowball's chance in hell, given current levels of public awareness about the real nature of these industries.
That being said, I applaud any such efforts to reframe this issue in terms of harm reduction.
Darn Jethro, you are pretty much posting for me too today. Thanks.
Excellent overview. at this rate the USA will be the last country to stop this drug control madness. If our govt. continues this cruelty, they will present themselves as the biggest fool on the planet. Or should that be "is" as in present tense.
The DEA and CIA are making waaaaaaay too much money from runing drugs and from their cuts of the drugs run by others.
The US government will be the last trafficker standing.
It's good to see Latin America finally beginning to see reason. The powerful groups you mention have a vested interest in keeping things the same, so nothing will EVER change here. If we are not the most reactionary country in the world, we sure are giving it the good old try. Snowball's chance in hell just about says it.
One of the privileges of the privileged is to look down on the unprivileged as children
My parents were alcoholics and my mother actually used the phrase "if we ever caught you using drugs we'll disown you" This was in mid 1960s.
I once asked my father about how one chemical in the body could be considered different than another and he said "That may be true but we don't need another drug to deal with".
The fact that he was getting HIS drug and deciding no one else got the same choice to glibly decide what "we need" was part of the unconscious arrogance of the privileged. "My world feels good, so things are good, if you aren't happy then something is the matter with you."
It isn't really mustache twirling evil. It is a "why should we stir things up when I'm happy?" attitude.
But this is also the reason the US will become fascist.
Things will get bad and people who are still doing okay will tire of "worrying (i.e. thinking about anyone else then themselves) and say Hey YOU, Mr Strong Man, you say you can deal with it - go do it!"
PS: Governments that make the US frown ... go down." .
""Reform campaigners have long argued that criminalisation enriched drug cartels, fuelled savage turf wars, corrupted state institutions and filled prisons with addicts who presented no real threat to society.""
***********************************************************
This is what the currently held american corporate position is because, legal or illegal, it is an industry and those in high corporate places want the profits just as the 'secret' intelligence agencies are up to their eyeballs in drugs and drug money and including all manner of illegal actions.
And drug cartels are nothing more or less than subsidiaries of corporations worldwide who operate under the aegis of 'oligarchy' rules of the game, meaning that 'you piss off those at the top and you end up in prison(manuel noriega(sp) or dead like pablo escobar)'.
So don't think this will ease the 'war on drugs, usa style, because that is another industry inside of an industry, after all, I mean, where are those poor lawyers going to make money and keep up their practices?
And what is this move into columbia with several more american military bases being opened other than to topple Chavez's government, I suspect the answer will not be long in coming unless South America convinces columbia to stop playing the 'little u.s.a.'?
This seems to be partly a result of the US loosing all moral authority it once had. This is in part due to its economic collapse. The US is devolving into just another third world country, albeit the one with the largest military. The 2 wars of empire currently running full steam are bankrupting the citizens at large, as well as exposing the Power Elite as genocidal monsters. Poverty levels are rising quickly. Health insurance is a luxury fewer and fewer can afford every day.
Harm reduction doesn't seem to enter into the calculations of the jack booted thugs who enforce our drug laws. It's all about pocketing huge sums, confiscating property, and smugly laughing about dirty drug users. I'm amazed this state of oppression has lasted this long actually. Someday the truth will out!!
Right - Obama has lifted the boot off the necks of the empires sub states. It was either that or make them all US citizens - I beleive that we have been intentionally taken down to protect the global elite from post Bush prosecution.
Drug war and drug business profit the same people up top. Since the 1960s we have lived in a Great Repression - drug war is just one tool used to keep the cabal that killed JFK etc in power. Read Family of Secrets by Russ Baker. Sadly, the truth has always been there for us to discover, but most fail to -
i have said it 2 weeks ago concerning this report from elsewhere:
what this does is take away from the USA ANOTHER of its FAKE excuses for placing troops and militarizing latin america:
it's so-called, much-touted, violent "WAR ON DRUGS"...which is really a cover for introducing american military presence to protect its "interests": its corporatism, its privatization schemes, its right-wing capitalist agenda.
that's all there is to it - as far as its "War on Drugs"...
the Latin Americans - if they push through firmly - have found a HUGE weakness in the American "policy" towards the region - and basically renders american "state department" and military policy -- MOOT.
anything ELSE the americans PROMOTE as Justification for continued military presence ANYWHERE in latin america is even MORE exposed for being the imperial design it is. and it makes the USA get "cornered" for lack of any other "reasons".....since ALL other reasons:
NAFTA, "free -trade", "globalization" , following US HISTORY of imperialism and rightwing government support that has resulted in devastation , is ITSELF already being discredited to severely
the only remaining "excuse" the USA really HAS HAD - has been "war on drugs".
REMOVE that from the USA -- and it has NOTHING .
"This seems to be partly a result of the US loosing all moral authority it once had."
Just when was it that the US had "moral authority"? You sure this just isn't a figment of your imagination? Ever since the US became an imperialist power (starting at its birth, when white Europeans wiped out the native population on the continent), in the eyes of the victims, there was no morality there. Maybe you're referring to the years when black slaves were uprooted from their homelands to fuel the growth of American capitalism? You know, that "moral authority".
The fact of the matter is that there has never been another nation on this planet that has brought more death and destruction to the peoples of this world, since WWII than the USA. The deaths of millions of people because of American imperialist "foreign policy" makes it very difficult for anyone outside the US to think of the US as having any "moral authority". Rather, the peoples of the world live in fear that this great "moral authority" may someday frown on them and unleash its military might on them if they attempt to live outside the command structure of the US free market system.
Its really time for "Americans" to stop living with the myths of how moral their nation is or was. It never was. Its history is washed in the blood of its many victims and that history didn't just start and end with G.W. Bush.
I very much used to favor this and may someday favor it again but for starters the title "War on Drugs" actually refers ONLY to the policy of Ronald Reagan, not a "war" on drugs that everyone precieves it to be. The classification was only used as a policy title/program and not actually an ongoing "war."
There are numerous reasons that I disagree with legalization but one stands out above the rest: Legalization is in direct ignorance to the original reality of drug abuse and use altogether, and that is that DRUGS ARE HARMFUL.
It doesn't matter what your personal beliefs on recreation and and liberal values are, the fact remains that these substances are an indirect and direct form of self-destruction.
Another justification is often used: Why should tobacco and alcohol remain legal? Well, fact is, perhaps they should not. Prohibition was one thing but that is because it was never fully enforced. More to the point, even if legalization was to occur, has anyone even considered the idea of how much harm will still be done? Potential users could now become users, education and family ties will suffer, accidents will become widespread, and security risks will abound. I am not saying that I will never support legalization, but we strongly need to consider what is going to happen if we do legalize. Also...World War III may very well be in Latin America and Mexico next.
Prohibition was not enforcable. All it did was to enrich the coffers of organized crime, and the cops/judges who were willing to be bought off; just like what happens today with the war on some drugs.
darkwraith07, the overwhelming empirical evidence (outside of the right wing evangelical fundy-ridden USA, of course) is that de-criminalising drug abuse and making it a medical problem -not a prison problem, works undeniable wonders. There is also no evidence that it increases drug use; from what I have read, it decreases it. This is not making it legal -which may be the next step after success with the removal from the criminal code.
But that doesn't suit the ideology of the fundies nor does it satisfy violent revenge urges and as numerous readers point out, these nonsensical wars on everything are all about money and power.
As someone who suffers from tobacco smoke I'd be happy if it was dis-invented. I could also live quite happily without alcohol but dream on if you think anyone could enforce a ban on tobacco and especially alcohol. Can you imagine the world without wine? It will never happen.
Authoritarian enforcement does not work.
The Holy Catholic Church and the Evangelicals are rife in South America telling their sheeple how the Devil is associated with the pleasure derived from the weed and the coke.
The Church and the Ruling Elite and the US and the CIA want to retain their edge in the status quo fight to keep the rich richer and the poor poorer.
The Church = Fascism and Domination