The international attempt to limit the global supply of drugs has been a profound failure by any measurement in terms of supply reduction.
This is the belief of Julia Buxton, Professor of Comparative Politics at SPP. A published expert on the drug trade, Buxton has a particular interest in the impact of narcotic drugs and counter narcotics policies on development, peace building, poverty and human rights. She is currently ethical adviser on the LINKSCH project'Drug Policy: Unintended Impacts' directed by Dr Alex Marshall, Glasgow University and was a member of the Andean Development Corporation project on drug policy reform in South America, contributing a working paper on the limitations of alternative development strategies in counter narcotics efforts.
"Rather than achieving a drug-free world," Buxton argues, "this effort has caused more harm than good, and the human rights abuses that we have seen associated with this effort to stem the flow of narcotics is really beyond acceptabilityin terms of contemporary international human rights standards."
Buxton was speaking during an interview for the CEU On Point series of videos. You can watch the full interview here.