The Search for Rational Drug Control

This book presents a comprehensive examination of the drug control policy process in the United States. How are policy choices identified, debated and selected? How are the consequences of governmental policy measured and evaluated? How, if at all, do we learn from our mistakes? Zimring and Hawkins present different ways of understanding American drug policy and provide a foundation for an improved policy process. They argue that protection of children and youth should shape policy toward illicit crime, with attention to the fact that youth protection objectives may limit the effectiveness of some drug controls.

This book presents a comprehensive examination of the drug control policy process in the United States. How are policy choices identified, debated, and selected? How are the consequences of governmental policy measured and evaluated? How, if at all, do we learn from our mistakes? The first part of the book deals with four different ways of understanding drug policy in the United States. Chapter 1 examines drug control as ideology; Chapter 2 discusses the issues of definition and measurement; Chapter 3 provides a historical analysis of drug control; and Chapter 4 concerns drug control as an occasion for debating the proper role of the criminal law. Part Two provides a foundation for an improved policy process by discussing priority problems for drug control. Chapter 5 shows how the protection of children and youth should shape policy toward illicit drugs, with attention to the fact that youth protection objectives may properly limit the effectiveness of some drug controls. Chapter 6 explores the central but complex relationship between illicit drugs and predatory crime. Chapter 7 addresses the proper role of the federal government in drug control policy. A final chapter criticizes the current national drug control strategy and makes five suggestions for improving the drug control policy process.