Considerable resources have been spent on estimating the size of populations of people who use drugs (PWUD) and people who inject drugs (PWID) in Africa. Precise estimates are elusive, not least because of stigma and criminalization faced by these populations. Bio-behavioral surveys focused on...

This article breaks new conceptual ground by questioning orthodox interpretations of nation state agency in the global drug wars. Specifically, it challenges the David vs. Goliath conception of Colombia as a passive, client state simply abiding to the United States' hegemonic war on drugs. It...

This volume is part of the response to the 2016 UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on international drug policy and the emergence of analysis of international drug policy in academic literature. Editors David Bewley-Taylor and Khalid Tinasti, both respected authors in their own right,...

This paper highlights the complex and contested relationship between drugs and development policies globally. It uses a recent experience in Thailand to showcase the link between drugs and development policies while highlighting the difficult international terrain for forging a common United...

For decades, international governments and the Peruvian state have worked to reduce illicit coca cultivation in valleys that were once among the largest global producers of coca. The principal strategies used in these interventions are drug crop eradication and alternative development (AD), both...

In a search for appropriate theory, this essay inserts drug trafficking, the world’s largest illicit economic activity, within a wider analytical frame called the ‘covert netherworld.’ Through the convergence of three factors-covert operations, illicit commerce, and social milieu-such...

The UNGASS process and the SDGs discussions renewed thinking on illicit drug economy and sustainable development linkages, and opened windows for enhanced policy coherence in that sense. Yet, the fragmentation of the drug policy arena and the complex SDGs task still question whether this will be...

Tramadol is a synthetic opioid that is widely used as an analgesic for alleviating pain of moderate to medium intensity. With potency estimated to be about one-tenth that of morphine, tramadol is considered as relatively safe with regard to poisonings or dependency. Yet there are increasing...

Puzzled about why and how coca-growing areas in Bolivia do not have the same levels of violence and criminality experienced in their communities, eight peasant leaders from various coca-growing areas of Colombia joined a study tour to investigate. Notwithstanding differences in histories of...

The voice and role of communities, particularly their capacity to organise and resist, has been understudied in the specialised literature on illicit crops and largely ignored in policy debates. Based on ongoing research in Colombia, this policy paper explores the capacity of communities to...