Drugs, Law, People, Place and the State

Though any psychoactive substance can be revered or reviled as a drug, as peoples cultural norms shift, ultimately its status is determined in law by the state. This publication explores the regulation of drugs alcohol and cannabis to heroin and cocaine and practices such as social drinking and public injecting under political regimes. Drugs are discussed in their geographical contexts: the colonial legacy of cannabis prohibition for bioprospecting in Africa; the veracity of the persistent notion of the narco-state; Turkeys governance of drinking amid civil unrest; and alcohols place in the neoliberal political economy of Ireland. In addition, drug policies are examined: from problems in managing drug-related litter in the UK to supervised injecting facility provision in Australia; harm reduction in Canada; and the global network of drug policy activists. Place is significant, but porous borders, territorial overlaps and multi-scalar linkages are influential in remaking the world through current challenges to the war on drugs. This book was originally published as a special issue of Space & Polity.