Though any psychoactive substance can be revered or reviled as a drug, as people’s 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; Turkey’s governance of drinking amid civil unrest; and alcohol’s 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.

Item Type:	Edited Book
Keywords:	drugs, public health, law, policy
Research Division:	Studies in Human Society
Research Group:	Human Geography
Research Field:	Social and Cultural Geography
Objective Division:	Expanding Knowledge
Objective Group:	Expanding Knowledge
Objective Field:	Expanding Knowledge through Studies of Human Society
Author:	Williams, S (Dr Stewart Williams)
ID Code:	121282
Year Published:	2017
Deposited By:	Geography and Spatial Science
Deposited On:	2017-09-20
Last Modified:	2017-09-21
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