This article identifies the early dictatorship of former President Ferdinand Marcos as a significant moment in drug policy in the Philippines, as well as the wider Southeast Asian region. Using methods of critical discourse analysis and the notion of episodic history, it shows how the Marcos...

This paper examines the rise and fall of the Administrative Bureau of Prohibited Drugs in 1920s Shanghai. It identifies the factors associated with the endeavours of the central government to experiment with establishing a Bureau dedicated to regulating refined drugs and the reasons why the...

This paper is the result of the study Apreensões de drogas no estado de São Paulo: Um raio-x das apreensões de drogas segundo ocorrências e massa [Drug Seizures in the State of São Paulo: An In-Depth View of Drug Seizures Broken Down by Number of Incidents and Drug Amounts], conducted by...

The debate about the prohibition of drugs has taken a fundamental turn with the publication of ‘Regulation: The Responsible Control of Drugs’ by the Global Commission on Drug Policy. This edition of the journal publishes papers addressing how to regulate drugs, which informed the Global...

Literature on the economic-sociology of illegal markets is progressing convincingly, as scholars identify the need to investigate illegality through the perspective of the market, as well as through the perspective of the actor. In this book review essay, two recent publications are reflected...

Various jurisdictions are legalising not just cannabis possession and use, but also large-scale commercial production, distribution and sale. Potential problems with that form of legalization raise questions about how best to implement a legalisation. This paper analyses the interests of the...

While it is common for United Nations member states in international meetings to espouse ‘public health approaches’ to drug policy, actual policies appear not to have caught up with this rhetoric. There is a lingering over-emphasis in narcotic drug policies on policing and incarceration at...