Decriminalisation of Narcotics
- Tanya Gupta
- July 2, 2020
Content :
Decriminalization is clearly no ‘silver bullet’; it can only aspire to reduce harms created, and costs incurred, by criminalization in the first place and does not reduce harms associated with the criminal trade on which it has little direct impact. If inadequately devised or implemented, decriminalization will have little impact, even potentially creating new problems such as net-widening. A more critical factor appears to be the degree to which decriminalization is part of a wider policy reorientation and resource reallocation away from harmful punitive enforcement and towards public-health-oriented and human-rights-based approaches targeted at PWUD, particularly young people and PWID. Decriminalization can be seen as a part of a broader harm reduction approach, as well as a key to creating an enabling environment for other public health interventions.
There are relatively few general conclusions that can be made about the impacts of decriminalization beyond the observation that it does not lead to the explosion in use that many fear. It found that individuals given criminal penalties were more likely to suffer negative employment, relationship and accommodation consequences as a result of their cannabis charge and were more likely to come into further contact with the criminal justice system.
