War on drugs a global failure, London School of Economics says

[Newsjock]

Source: CBC News

The war on drugs must end and the battle to change international drug policies must begin, says a new report from the London School of Economics.

Five Nobel Prize-winning economists signed off on the 84-page report entitled Ending the Drug Wars: Report of the LSE Expert Group on the Economics of Drug Policy authored by leading drug policy experts and supported by political figures from around the world calling for drug law reform.

The authors offer compelling evidence that achieving a “drug-free world” based solely on a prohibitionist model is an expensive and wasted effort. According to John Collins, co-ordinator of LSE IDEAS International Drug Policy Project and editor of the report, the drug policy experts' recommendations show how the war on drugs is a failure requiring a "major rethink of international drug policies."

... The LSE report is a primer to the conversation on global drug reform policy for the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Drugs 2016, the main policy making arm of the UN.


Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/war-on-drugs-a-global-failure-london-school-of-economics-says-1.2636263

[MindMover]

1. This is a humongous, NO SHIT .... nt

[Ed Suspicious]

2. Yeah, but five Nobel Prize winning economists are surely going to be more persuasive than

you with your shoulder shrugging dismissiveness.

[Ed Suspicious]

4. A smile on your face? Good. Keep a positive attitude, slugger.

[pbmus]

11. You are a smart enough person to know that brought a smile ...

to a lot of peoples faces ....

[sakabatou]

8. +100

[Comrade Grumpy]

13. You're missing the point. This is more piling on ahead of upcoming UN sessions.

And that is a good thing.

The report is "a primer to the conversation on global drug reform policy for the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Drugs 2016, the main policy making arm of the UN."

The prohibitionist consensus around the UN Single Convention and subsequent anti-drug treaties is crumbling, and the UNGASS is where the battle will be fought.

Bolivia has already rejected the language criminalizing the coca leaf.

Uruguay is selling marijuana.

Two US states have legalized marijuana, and more will before the UNGASS.

Most of the rest of Latin America wants an alternative to "the failed war on drugs" where it has taken a lot of casualties.

Most of the Europeans are tired of the drug war, too.

The LSE report just adds to the momentum for change.

[otherone]

17. thanks for the post

On to 2016!

[1000words]

6. The "War on Drugs" was never meant to achieve it's publically-stated goal.

In certain regards, however, it has served it's purpose well. Just like the "War on Terror."

[Yavin4]

10. Yes. Enriching the Law Enforcement community, both legally and illegally. n/t

[riderinthestorm]

14. And the CIA to fund illegal activity.

In that sense its been a smashing success

[Scuba]

16. Gee, ya think?

[The Traveler]

7. Well, this report can hardly be said to be news

Most of us who have lived on the front lines of the real world (like you and I) have been painfully aware of this for a long time. Glad to see "persons of influence" are finally catching on. And it only took them a couple of decades!!!

It will probably take them only a couple more to actually implement a reasonable policy. By then, Miami should be pretty much underwater ... because they still haven't really figured out the climate change thingy, either.

Trav

[Lionel Mandrake]

21. These particular "persons of influence" are practitioners of the "dismal science",

aka economics, which isn't a science.

In real science, the experts actually discover new facts.

[Yavin4]

9. Capitalism is failing. War on drugs is failing.

What is this? "Shit we already fucking knew" month?

[Uncle Joe]

12. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, Newsjock.

[Fumesucker]

15. Bullshit, the drug war is doing exactly what it was and is intended to do

Now it might be a failure according to the publicly stated purpose but that's just a smoke screen.

[RainDog]

18. k&r n/t

[William769]

20. Nicey Nicey?