The war on drugs is often associated with and located in the United States of America, but only few people are (restrictedly) aware of what actually is beyond this ‘war’, i.e. ‘Who are the protagonists?’, ‘What is the cause of it?’, ‘Which methods are applied to fulfil which targets?’, ‘Why is it called a war at all and against whom or what is it waged?’ and most importantly, ‘What is the outcome of its efforts?’
The war on drugs itself, however, has often been depicted and denoted as both racist and a failure at various levels due to several wrong decisions committed by politicians as well as federal and local state officials, who on the one hand specifically mistreated certain demographic groups with methods of questionable legality and on the other hand tremendously failed with regards to foreign affairs.
After a short terminological introduction this essay first discusses developments in foreign affairs and their contribution to the war’s failure; It then moves on to discuss occurrences concerning domestic policies with regards to racial disparity; It then discusses the controversy of legalization whereby it essentially focuses on theoretical approaches and conceptions from the source’s point of view and finally, merges into a conclusion.
Table of contents
1. Introduction
1.1 Key-term introduction
2. Supporting statement 1: foreign affairs
3. Supporting statement 2: domestic policy
4. Supporting statement 3: legalization issues
5. Conclusion
6. Works cited page
1. Introduction
The war on drugs is often associated with and located in the United States of America, but only few people are (restrictedly) aware of what actually is beyond this ‘war’, i.e. ‘Who are the protagonists?’, ‘What is the cause of it?’, ‘Which methods are applied to fulfil which targets?’, ‘Why is it called a war at all and against whom or what is it waged?’ and most importantly, ‘What is the outcome of its efforts?’
The war on drugs itself, however, has often been depicted and denoted as both racist and a failure at various levels due to several wrong decisions committed by politicians as well as federal and local state officials, who on the one hand specifically mistreated certain demographic groups with methods of questionable legality and on the other hand tremendously failed with regards to foreign affairs.
Approaches to regional anti-drug initiatives such as ‘Plan Mérida’ for Mexico or ‘Plan Colombia’ – for Colombia, obviously – turned out to be ineffective (Carpenter 3f.). Also, restrictions by the United States against neighboring drug-cultivating states did not result in a satisfactory outcome, since cultivation habits had shifted to another country or region – this is what Benavie called the “balloon effect” (“holy war” 17).
Also, with regards to domestic policy the war on drugs caused immense costs and provoked racial injustice to African American citizens by means of manipulating and undermining laws and even the constitution. As a matter of fact, fatal wrong decisions concerning incarceration and prison policies led to overcrowded jails and prisons and as a result, to the release of villains who presumably did far worse than selling crack.
Moreover, significant shifts in policy emerged over time: The debate about legalization is about to make repercussions in both some American states and the residual world. As a result, many nations have realized that the scaremongering tactics of governments and the media come to nothing. Such campaigns “demonize the enemy and the drug war is no exception” (Benavie, “holy war” 9). In fact, such strategies cause counter-effects to what they originally targeted.
After a short terminological introduction this essay first discusses developments in foreign affairs and their contribution to the war’s failure; It then moves on to discuss occurrences concerning domestic policies with regards to racial disparity; It then discusses the controversy of legalization whereby it essentially focuses on theoretical approaches and conceptions from the source’s point of view and finally, merges into a conclusion.
1.1 Key-term introduction
At first, it makes sense to recapitulate the terms ‘ power’, respectively ‘ biopower’ and ‘biopolitics’ and ‘ race’, for these key terms will frequently reoccur and be coherent with the matter of the war on drugs:
The concept of biopolitics “can be understood as a political rationality which takes the administration of life and populations as its subject: ‘to ensure, sustain, and multiply life, to put this life in order’” (Adams). The concept of Biopower “names the way in which biopolitics is put to work in society and involves what Foucault describes as ‘a very profound transformation of [the] mechanisms of power’ of the Western classic age”.
Race, however,
“is a powerful social category forged historically through oppression, slavery, and conquest [and] most geneticists agree that racial taxonomies at the DNA level are invalid. Genetic differences within any designated racial group are often greater than differences between racial groups. Most genetic markers do not differ sufficiently by race to be useful in medical research” (“Race & Ethnicity”).
To sum up, race as a social category only determines social differences that are rooted in the discourse in which they are used in.
So, after the terminology was clarified adequately, the essay now moves on to developments of foreign affairs in the United States.
2. Supporting statement 1: foreign affairs
The following chapter is introduced by providing a brief historical overview of the emergence of the drug war. This war was originated in 1971 by Richard Nixon. He is the person who is said to be the initiator of and person who coined the term ‘war on drugs’. Nixon legitimized this war by stating that it “had the ability to impact the security of the United States” (Zepeda ix). As a result, he as well established the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in 1973 to combat drug trafficking. The containment attempt not only of combatting the drug supply but also of reducing its demand resulted in a more modern phase of the war on drugs in the 1980s during Reagan’s administration which included “military campaigns in the Andean region as three countries in the region [i.e.] Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru, historically (…) produced the world’s coca supply” (x). Those military campaigns, however, resulted in what was mentioned in the preface already, namely a ‘balloon effect’; It basically means that “drug trafficking balloons out to other regions when governments and authorities attempt to combat cultivation, production and trafficking routes in one [or more] region[s]” (Benavie, “holy war” 17). Also related to this phenomenon, such plans and administrations failed to detect drug traffickers, for they became subjects of what researchers call the ‘cockroach effect’, meaning that “organizations will fragment and become smaller (…) as they try to avoid detection by government authorities” (Zepeda x). In fact, the enforcement of the United States to dictating terms and conditions to other countries could be realized due to the fact that many states in the Americas depended on financial aids from Washington and therefore, had to comply with the rules (xii).
Plan Colombia that was designed to help bring peace to Colombia originally (xi) and the Mérida Initiative that was designed as “hardline approach to the issue of mind-altering drugs” (Carpenter 1), were over time converted into a war against both drugs and terrorism; The country increasingly experienced internal armed conflicts. With regards to the fusion of the war on drugs and the war on terrorism, Zepeda raised an interesting question: “Are drug trafficking organizations terrorists or [even] drug traffickers?” In his opinion, they are not, for they “have no visible ideological agenda [and] their only political goal is [a] weaker law enforcement” (Zepeda xii).
In Mexico and other countries in central America, however, the Mérida Initiative was predominant and more beneficial than in other countries it was designed for: It provided 84 percent of its resources exclusively for Mexico. They pledged $1.6 billion in U.S. counter-narcotics aid over three years (Carpenter 7); So, unsurprisingly, the Calderón administration in Mexico welcomed the funding especially because they also wanted “to combat the drug cartels [because they] did not have confidence in the police as they [were] extremely corrupt” (Zepeda xiv). In addition to this, the U.S. funding was used to strengthen “the capabilities of military and police units (…), sophisticated hardware, helicopters (…) and surveillance technology” (Carpenter 8). In other words, the Mérida Initiative’s emphasis was on improving military resources in Mexico, predominantly controlled and funded by the U.S. As a result, the cooperation between America and Mexico has had partial victories, too but paradoxically, it has also increased domestic violence since the Calderón administration has launched their internal war on drugs. According to Zepeda, the end of the war on drugs can be scheduled to the Obama administration in 2014 (xvi). Nonetheless, it is hard to take this statement for granted, because it is to assume that the drug war, respectively the war on minorities it is associated with goes on concealed, albeit the actual war still has failed.
[...]