\nThe 19-member commission, a private venture chaired by ex-Brazilian\npresident Fernando Henrique Cardoso, includes George Schultz, President\nReagan’s Secretary of State; Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin\nGroup; former U.N. Secretary General Koffi Anna; George Papandreou,\nprime minister of Greece; Paul Volcker, former chairman of the Federal\nReserve, and Javier Solana,former EU foreign minister.\n<\/blockquote>\nHere’s their full report.<\/a>\n\nWhat do they recommend?\n\n\n
\nEnd the criminalization, marginalization, and stigmatization of people who\nuse drugs but who do no harm to others. Challenge rather than reinforce\ncommon misconceptions about drug markets, drug use and drug dependence.\n\nEncourage experimentation by governments with models of legal regulation\nof drugs to undermine the power of organized crime and safeguard\nthe health and security of their citizens. This recommendation\napplies especially to cannabis, but we also encourage other experiments in\ndecriminalization and legal regulation that can accomplish these objectives\nand provide models for others.\n
\nOffer health and treatment services\nto those in need. Ensure that a variety of treatment modalities are\navailable, including not just methadone and buprenorphine treatment but\nalso\nthe heroin-assisted treatment programs that have proven successful\nin many European countries and Canada. Implement syringe access and\nother harm reduction measures that have proven effective in\nreducing transmission of HIV and other blood-borne infections as\nwell as fatal overdoses. Respect the human rights of people who use\ndrugs. Abolish abusive practices carried out in the name of treatment\n\u2013 such as forced detention, forced labor, and physical or\npsychological abuse \u2013 that contravene human rights standards and norms\nor that remove the right to self-determination.\n
\nApply much the same principles and policies stated above to people\ninvolved in the lower ends of illegal drug markets, such as farmers,\ncouriers and petty sellers.\nMany are themselves victims of violence and intimidation or are drug\ndependent. Arresting and incarcerating tens of millions of these\npeople in recent decades has filled prisons and destroyed lives and\nfamilies without reducing the availability of illicit drugs or the power\nof criminal organizations. There appears to be almost no limit to the\nnumber of people willing to engage in such activities to better their\nlives, provide for their families, or otherwise escape poverty. Drug\ncontrol resources are better directed elsewhere.\n
\nInvest in activities that can both prevent young people from taking\ndrugs in the first place and also prevent those who do use drugs\nfrom developing more serious problems. Eschew simplistic \u2018just say\nno\u2019 messages and \u2018zero tolerance\u2019 policies in favor of educational\nefforts grounded in credible information and prevention programs\nthat focus on social skills and peerinfuences. The most successful\nprevention efforts may be those targeted at specfic at-risk groups.\n
\nFocus repressive actions on violent criminal organizations, but do so in\nways that undermine their power and reach while prioritizing the reduction\nof violence and intimidation. Law enforcement efforts should focus\nnot on reducing drug markets per se but rather on reducing their harms to\nindividuals, communities and national security.\n
\nBegin the transformation of the global drug prohibition regime. Replace\ndrug policies and strategies driven by ideology and political convenience\nwith fiscally responsible policies and strategies grounded in science,\nhealth, security and human rights \u2013 and adopt appropriate criteria for\ntheir evaluation. Review the scheduling of drugs that has resulted in\nobvious anomalies like the flawed categorization of cannabis, coca\nleaf and MDMA. Ensure that the international conventions are interpreted\nand\/or revised to accommodate robust experimentation with harm reduction,\ndecriminalization and legal regulatory policies.\n
\nBreak the taboo on debate and reform. The time for action is now.\n<\/blockquote>\n
\nSounds better than building a private prison in Lowndes County, Georgia, to lock more people up.\nSpend that tax money on education instead.\n
\n-jsq\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stop locking up drug users who harm no others, legalize drugs starting with marijuana, switch to health and treatment, stop harrassing farmers, abandon zero tolerance and invest instead in youth activities, focus on reducing harm, and do it now, so says a commission of business moguls, former heads of state, financial professionals, writers, and activists. […]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[97,202,1113,48,40,14,15,2,41,19,1381,72,21,22,178],"tags":[4467,8817,1363,77,8705,8701,4369,4464,876,8730,3129,7,75,4466,2712,4465],"class_list":["post-1956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-agriculture","category-cca","category-code-enforcement","category-community","category-economy","category-education","category-government","category-health-care","category-history","category-immigration","category-incarceration","category-planning","category-politics","category-vlcia","tag-action","tag-cca","tag-debate","tag-drugs","tag-education","tag-georgia","tag-global-commission-on-drug-policy","tag-harm","tag-health","tag-incarceration","tag-legalization","tag-lowndes-county","tag-prison","tag-reform","tag-rehabilitation","tag-taboo"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-vy","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1956","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1956"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1956\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1956"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1956"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1956"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}