Three Latin American presidents call drug prohibition a failure

February 14, 10:22 AMCivil Liberties ExaminerJ.D. Tuccille

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Former Mexican President Ernesto
Zedillo (pictured) joined with Brazil's
former President Fernando Henrique
Cardoso and former Colombian
President César Gaviria to call
U.S.-style drug prohibition a failure.

Former presidents of Brazil, Colombia and Mexico joined together last week to announce a report calling current U.S.-led international drug policies counterproductive and to suggest that governments should consider alternative policies, including marijuana decriminalization. Their report is the culmination of a growing body of research that suggests that the American-style "war on drugs" breeds violence without making a dent in drug production or consumption.

The three former chief executives, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, of Brazil, César Gaviria, of Colombia, and Ernesto Zedillo, of Mexico, are co-presidents of the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy, which was established to evaluate the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of current drug policy. The commission's report, Drugs and Democracy: Toward a Paradigm Shift (PDF), bluntly states:

Prohibitionist policies based on the eradication of production and on the disruption of drug flows as well as on the criminalization of consumption have not yielded the expected results. We are farther than ever from the announced goal of eradicating drugs.

The report points out that, even as prohibition efforts have intensified, Latin America has remained the world's major producer of cocaine and marijuana and is rapidly becoming a major exporter of opiates and synthetic drugs. Demand for drugs is also increasing throughout Latin America.

At the same time, the report says, organized crime has increased and the drug trade has grown more violent, with that violence infecting political institutions, resulting in "The corruption of public servants, the judicial system, governments, the political system and, especially the police forces in charge of enforcing law and order."

While the report stops short of a call for legalization, it does call for distinguishing among illicit substances and consideration of alternative strategies, including European-style "harm reduction," which treats drug use more as a public health issue than a criminal concern. By contrast, the U.S. policy of "massive incarceration of drug users" is described as "questionable both in
terms of respect for human rights and its efficiency" and impractical for Latin America.

The report issued by the three former presidents also explicitly calls for marijuana decriminalization to be considered.

The commission's report comes on the heels of similar findings by research organization in the United States and elsewhere. Last year, the the Brookings Institution reported that America's drug policies has had little effect and found less support in Latin America:

Although eradication has not reduced drug consumption in the US nor substantially weakened belligerent groups – the FARC has been weakened since 2002 as a result of direct operations by the Colombian military funded with US counterinsurgency money, not by eradication of illicit crops – and has little resonance with local populations, the U.S. has nonetheless demanded that Latin American governments make eradication and counternarcotics policies their top anti-crime and national security policies.

And just last week, the Cato Institute issued a paper (PDF) by foreign policy expert Ted Galen Carpenter calling drug prohibition the main culprit in Mexico's growing problem with violent crime:

Abandoning the prohibitionist model of dealingwith the drug problemis the only effectiveway to stem the violence in Mexico and its spillover into the United States. Other proposed solutions, including preventing the flow of guns from the U.S. to Mexico, establishing tighter control over the border, and (somehow) winning the war on drugs are futile.As long as the prohibitionist strategy is in place, the huge blackmarket premium in illegal drugs will continue, and the lure of that profit, together with the illegality, guarantees that the most ruthless, violence-prone elements will dominate the trade. Ending drug prohibition would de-fund the criminal trafficking organizations and reduce their power.

The latest report by three high-ranking Latin American political figures denouncing prohibition makes it quite clear that supporters of "war on drugs"-style prohibition are increasingly isolated. Their policies are viewed here and abroad as breeding violence without achieving any benefits in the countries in which they have been imposed by American dictate.

Whether even that is enough to shift policy in Latin America, let alone the United States, remains to be seen.

Contact J.D.: civilliberties (at) tuccille.com