NCJ Number
196841
Journal
Transnational Organized Crime Volume: 5 Issue: 1 Dated: Spring 1999 Pages: 67-96
Date Published
1999
Length
30 pages
Annotation
This article reviews and assesses some of the main elements of the etiology of the psychoactive drug supply commonly used to formulate and implement drug-control policies; it identifies some economic, social, and political factors that have been overlooked in these analyses and illustrates the structural causes underlying Bolivia's, Colombia's, and Peru's competitive advantage in drug trafficking.
Abstract
The causes most often identified to explain why less developed countries produce illicit drugs are poverty, economic inequality, corruption, and economic crisis. In developed countries, explanations based on anomie, social marginalization, and poverty are advanced. These explanations provide the bases for current drug-control policy, but in the Andean region they are, at best, partially satisfactory. There is no doubt that poverty, economic inequality, corruption, and crises create incentives for illegal economic behavior, but there is no simple cause-and-effect relationship between these factors and illegal economic behavior. In order to formulate effective anti-drug policies, it is necessary to understand why in some circumstances these factors become triggering causes for the development of illegal drugs, but do not in other contexts. A thorough study of the territorial distribution of the illegal drugs industry in the Andean region shows that despite its high profitability, economic factors and traditional comparative advantage approaches alone cannot explain why some countries produce and market illegal drugs and others do not, or why some grow coca but have not developed extensive cocaine exporting networks like others. The reasons are based in the history and institutions of each society and their evolution. A comparison of the Andean societies reveals significant institutional differences that have made them more or less attractive as locations for illegal drug industries; for example, Colombia, which is heavily involved in drug production and trafficking, is the most modern of the Andean countries, which has led to the weakening of its traditional social control institutions. Colombians have been liberated from many traditional restrictions, resulting in an extremely individualistic society. This has facilitated a thriving illegal industry and a related high level of violence. In every society where social behavioral controls are weakened by institutional change, there is a possibility for growth of illegal activities, including the illegal drugs industry. 69 notes