Portugal: 10 years of decriminalized drugs

Here's a good Boston Globe report on the first decade of Portugal's bold experiment with drug decriminalization and increased treatment. Ten years ago, Portugal -- whose drug problem had been spiraling out of control -- decided to treat drug addiction as a public health matter, not as a criminal matter. They decriminalized possession of drugs, and increased treatment available to addicts, and experienced an immediate, dramatic and sustained drop in negative effects from drug use -- though the use of some drugs went up.

In this sense, one drug policy expert noted, the Portuguese experiment has become a sort of Rorschach test -- in the dark blobs on the page, people can see whatever they want to see. But Tom McLellan, the former deputy director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy under President Obama, said he's happy for the conversation. While not in favor of decriminalization, McLellan believes that the American debate over drug reform has become too polarized, with one side calling for incarceration and the other for legalization. "And I just don't buy it," McLellan said. The answer is likely somewhere in the middle, he believes, and perhaps that's where we can learn something from Portugal, a country that at least tried something new.

"I like that approach to drug policy," McLellan said. "Policy is really a product. And like a product, policy can be made better with experimentation and honest evaluation, rather than stupid polemic polarization of ideology."

Drug experiment (via Kottke)

• [Anonymous]

  McLellan is incoherent. He opposes decriminalization. He says he wants something in between incarceration and legalization. Usually that would mean decriminalization (i.e. an infraction, not a misdemeanor or felony, but still not “legal”).

  Ok so, despite opposing decriminalization, he likes what Portugal has done. And what Portugal has done is decriminalization.

  As for the policies that the Obama administration actually supports, it’s crystal clear. They want to continue prohibition even if it means overturning the will of the electorate.

  “In a letter sent last week to former Drug Enforcement Administration officials, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder noted that the Department of Justice “strongly opposes Proposition 19,” which would legalize marijuana in California. He wrote, “If passed, this legislation will greatly complicate federal drug enforcement efforts to the detriment of our citizens.” Holder also indicated that the federal government might sue to overturn the ballot measure if it is passed by voters on Nov. 2, writing that DOJ “is considering all available legal and policy options.”

  http://www.californiahealthline.org/articles/2010/10/18/obama-administration-steps-up-opposition-to-prop-19.aspx

  “Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske issued a two-sentence statement applauding the defeat of Prop 19:

  “Today, Californians recognized that legalizing marijuana will not make our citizens healthier, solve California’s budget crisis, or reduce drug related violence in Mexico,” read the statement. “The Obama administration has been clear in its opposition to marijuana legalization because research shows that marijuana use is associated with voluntary treatment admissions for addiction, fatal drugged driving accidents, mental illness and emergency room admissions.””

  http://www.californiahealthline.org/articles/2010/10/18/obama-administration-steps-up-opposition-to-prop-19.aspx

• [Anonymous]

  The big question is, would you take heroin if it was legal?

  I wouldn’t, also I can’t imagine anyone else doing it.

• [gwailo_joe]

  I would like to know if crime as a whole has measurably risen (or dropped) since the de-criminalization.

  If more people are doing drugs and crashing cars into pre-schools or setting churches on fire. . .well, that’s bad.

  If however drug use has increased; but robberies, murders and the like have decreased. . .then what’s the problem?

  No doubt having a society of drug addicts is not particularly desirable.

  But why in the hell do we prefer to create a society of criminals???

  oh yesh, thanks #1. sigh.

  • [Gilgongo]

    Crime decreased following decriminalization. At least, if it had *increased*, I would very much expect the legislation never to have made it past its first anniversary, let alone 10 YEARS without any sign of it being repealed.

    But note the comparison to a Rorschach test here. Each side will see in social policy what they want to see, because drug use has become a moral, crusading cause not thought of in rational terms any more.

• [Anonymous]

  Well, I am from Portugal.
  All that I can say is that we the numbers of addicts on Heroin dropped significantly. Had to do also with demystifying the whole concept of drugs and with more information about drugs and their consequences. The treatment also helped lots of people that used to be hocked on drugs. Nowadays we can notice that criminality had dropped and that all bigger cities are safer than before.
  It’s true that some drugs consumption has raised. Cannabis and Haxixe for example are more popular now and there was even a referendum few time ago for the complete liberalization of it. At the same time, hallucinogenic and stimulant (energetic) drugs, synthetic and others, became more and more popular since then.
  I don’t believe that prohibition can be right way. People will always try to break the limits and get what’s forbidden. It’s very simple.
  What happend in Portugal was a good exemple for all the countries that insist in sending people to jail because they are addicted to drugs, or because the simply because they did it for fun one time.
  Beside that it’s just pure hypocrisy that a nation of people hocked to prozac keeps treating like criminals people that smoke marijuana. It’s just insane! – People blamed for criminality because they are stoned while everybody can have a gun, which is something that only the police should be carrying. Here we need a licence – difficult and expensive to take.
  So simple and so effective!
  Want solutions? Get to the bottom (roots) of the problems then.

• [Anonymous]

  Works for Portugal because Portugal is interested in treating drug addiction as a problem that needs to be solved.
  The U.S. is not concerned with the reduction or treatment of Drug abuse.
  The U.S. is concerned with using the “Drug War” as a military and criminal justice driven revenue stream

  • [Shithead]

    Works for Portugal because Portugal is interested in treating drug addiction as a problem that needs to be solved.
    The U.S. is not concerned with the reduction or treatment of Drug abuse.
    The U.S. is concerned with using the “Drug War” as a military and criminal justice driven revenue stream
    ————————————
    Agree 100%. These people see the prison system and the “war on drugs” as a cushy, high paying job.

• [Eris Siva]

  And this isn’t the first case of an experiment of this kind working. There’s an excellent book covering this called Drug Crazy: How We Got Into This Mess and How We Can Get Out by Mike Gray

  Prohibition has been shown time and time again to cause more problems than it solves. Real world examples like this are heartening.

• [turn_self_off]

  What is banned and what is tolerated is more of a cultural topic then a medical one. Alcohol is as bad, or worse, then some of the drugs being banned around the world, but as it is a old cultural thing as much as anything else it gets to stay.

• [turn_self_off]

  Oh and if we want to cut down on drug use, all kinds of them, we need to reconsider how we live our lives collectively. The hunt for careers and external showpieces to remind ourselves and others of our “success” needs to stop. The most potent drugs are being used as much by the suits gaming the stock market as those slowly dying in the alleys, all to keep up with the pressure of modern life.

• [Anonymous]

  I read that the ‘increase’ in drug use of ‘some drugs’ was really more of an increase in ‘people who have TRIED’ drugs. Sure, if some stuff were legal I might try it once just to see what it was like, but that shouldn’t put me in the ‘addict’ column. I take umbrage at how that particular question was worded, and would like to see what the stats would be if the question were worded “Have you tried $drug more than $arbitrary_number of times?” From a society thing, I don’t think ‘casual’ or ‘occasional’ use (call it less than once every three months) would really be anything to be concerned about.

  • [Anonymous]

    I read that the ‘increase’ in drug use of ‘some drugs’ was really more of an increase in ‘people who have TRIED’ drugs.

    I took it to mean an increase in the number of people who answered the question honestly, as beforehand, they would be admitting to a stranger that they committed a crime.

• [osmo]

  “I like that approach to drug policy,” McLellan said. “Policy is really a product. And like a product, policy can be made better with experimentation and honest evaluation, rather than stupid polemic polarization of ideology.”

  This was the only part of it that sort of turned me off the article… or more precisely McLellan. The idea that there is one objectively true way to handle society is one that has become more and more common. The notion that you can, somehow measure out the perfect society by ignoring ideology

• [thatbob]

  “Policy can be made better with experimentation and honest evaluation, rather than stupid polemic polarization of ideology.”

  While I don’t disagree with the above statement, what’s interesting to me is that millions of pages of experimentation and honest evaluation have already been written on the topic, both here and abroad, and what really needs to happen now is for all of this sensibly improved policy to be renamed and rebranded as some kind of middle-of-the-road compromise between two intractable always-at-war positions, that they can play football over – because neither the media, public, nor legislature appear to be interested in any closely studied, sensibly improved policies on those terms alone. There are only the two deeply entrenched wing positions, and some vague ill-defined compromise that neither is really allowed to be working toward.

  What I mean is, although he SAYS that “one side [is] calling for incarceration and the other for legalization,” and he SAYS that the answer lies somewhere in the middle, the Portuguese solution and others like it do not seem to me to lie anywhere near the middle. They decriminalize drugs. They end incarceration. So they’re a lot closer to the left wing’s wet dream then they are to a “compromise” in the middle.

  But they’ll never pass a majority in Congress if you admit these things.

  I think it was the same dance 65 years ago when we passed social security, medicare, employment insurance, and other parts of the New Deal by pretending that they were not socialist. 65+ years later, and we continue to adamantly insist that we are not a socialist country, even though all of our socialist government programs are the most popular ones, nigh sacred.

  It’s kind of like driving grandma to Niagara Falls when she’s hell bent on going to Florida. You have to start by telling her you’re driving to Alaska, and after an 8 to 12 hour fussy car ride, you “compromise” when you pull into Niagara Falls. But when she gets home, she tells everyone how lovely Florida was. And the next summer she wants to go see the waterfalls in Florida again, so you take her back to Niagara Falls, and it becomes a sacred & hallowed tradition.

  (In this story the grandma is the intractable right wing, but I think it’s a dynamic that works the other way all the time, too. Weren’t “welfare reform” and “NAFTA” represented as compromise positions with the left wing? But weren’t they fully right wing pieces of legislation?)

  • [2k]

    …I see. So the Left’s position must become something like my own; “Mandatory drugs for all”.

• [senorglory]

  fuck you, former deputy director McLellan, the war on drugs is toxic and must come to an end.

• [usa1]

  “THE WAR ON DRUGS IS OVER” PEOPLE OF THE USA GET OVER IT. drug use is an illness and not a crime! putting people in prison for using drugs, should be a crime, but the GOV. wont do anything, the people when they get on jury’s may and should convict no one on drug charges, there is nothing the GOV. can do about it. Because the judge tells the jury that they are required to follow the LAW, doesnt make it true. Fact is the jury may disregard the LAW, not convict the defendant and there is nothing the JUDGE nor the GOV. in the USA can do about it!

• [malek]

  decriminaliation of non-addictive drugs is probably the best option out of the rut and such silly stories. http://wp.me/pQ1Eg-FV

• [toyg]

  From an European perspective, all this attention on Portugal is somewhat surprising.
  In most western European countries, simple possession of most drugs has been legal more or less for the last 20 years. That battle was won a long time ago: despite constant political noise, most police forces don’t really want to waste time dealing with random stoners, and won’t bother enforcing any sort of old-school blanket ban. The Portuguese law might be a bit more permissive than the average, but the fundamental principle has been widely adopted, in practice, everywhere else.

  Unfortunately, for things to work properly you should also legalize and regulate production and distribution, and this has never been done, not even in the Netherlands. Now we have this crazy situation where a large, legal demand cannot be satisfied by a transparent and regulated market, but instead has to rely on shady and ever-changing networks of (untaxed) foreign suppliers, endangering consumers as well as anybody involved (often unwillingly) in distribution.

  Europeans were really looking up to Californians to pave the way for such a grand experiment, last year; History called, but the citizens of the Golden State chose not to answer. And now you’re talking about one of the crappiest Euro states, which is only now catching up with long-established practices, like it was this incredible laboratory of revolutionary theories… it’s sad.

  • [Anonymous]

    i believe you have been misinformed. drugs like marijuana, cocaine, heroin or ecstasy are, in all countries of the european union, illegal, as is their possession, in all or almost all countries.
    there have been (successful) attempts to decriminalize the possession or even distribution. holland “tolerates” the sale and possession of cannabis, but it’s still illegal. in germany, you will not be prosecuted for the possession of a (varying, depending which state you’re in) amount of cannabis, it will be seized, though, and you will get a criminal charge, which will then be automatically turned down on the level of prosecutors office.
    that being said, here in germany, even if you get busted with a kilogram of cannabis, and clear intent to distribute, you will most certainly not get jail time, but a fine or a suspended sentence.
    as it is with european law, if a substance is legal in one country, it can’t be illegal in the other countries. (you’d probly have to sue your own government at the european court to follow this rule, but you’d win). that, of course, makes it virtually impossible for any country to fully legalize a drub like cannabis, as all the other countries would gang up on you.
    but there is no “war on drugs” here in europe. in most countries, addiction is treated as a medical condition. of course, heroin addicts might end up in prison, here in germany, but not for the possession or consumption of the drug, but for the illegal acts they will have committed to finance their habit. they generally can get treatment for their addiction in prison – although, in reality, in prison they can get every drug they like, too…
    but we’re still quite far away from ending the prohibition of illegal, recreational drugs.

    • [toyg]

      there have been (successful) attempts to decriminalize the possession or even distribution.

      Which is what I said: in practice, possession for personal use has been legalized for years in most countries (Italy, UK, Switzerland, Spain, I believe even France), with only ridiculously small penalties left.

      On a deep political level, the battle on that has been won, as the decriminalization of users meant less people experienced jail, which is a big factor in heroin uptake rates and re-offending in general.

• [Nom_de_Guerre]

  I’m portuguese and I have to say 2 things:

  1. Like someone said, there has been an increase on drug use but, like someone said, it is an increase of people who have tried drugs, especially marijuana, which is still considered a drug here (even though the police rarely pays much notice to casual users).
  Drug overdose and hepathitis and AIDS from needle sharing have sharply decreased.

  2. It is useless to just look at decriminalization alone while ignoring other factors put into practice, namely what we call “proximity police”, which is basically assigning permanent police officers to specific neighbourhoods in a social assistance approach, as well as vigilance (drug use and trasaction is always very localized), works better if the officers grew up in these places. Also there were extensive but incomplete educational programs regarding drug use in shcools, prisons and hospitals.

  The main goal is working- users are now patients while drug dealers are more heavily criminalized. It is far from perfect- drug use in prisons increased a lot with decriminalization, but it is a start.

• [Floyd R Turbo]

  Great article. I’m something of a reformed drug warrior. I never supported long prison terms for drug users — especially those with no violent histories or convictions, and while I’m not for legalization I am in support of decriminalization — especially for users and addicts.

  I might be persuaded to support legalization if I thought those who support it (generally speaking — I know many do) had some plan for what will surely be an increase of usage of drugs and the social/health consequences to follow. And yes it will… anytime anything is legalized — whether it’s gambling abortion, etc. it increases.

  Ironically the bureaucracy of government regulation might do more to kill drug usage than any criminal justice scheme.

  In an case it looks like Portugal is on to something.

  • [travtastic]

    So what’s your plan for the “usage of drugs and the social/health consequences”? Less than long prison terms for drug users?

    The decriminalization guys have had plans for that for decades. Investment of drug war money into poor areas, and treatment.

• [mr_mediocre]

  Per the folks at Lawyers, Guns and Money, the phrase to use is “The War on (Certain Classes of People Who Use Certain) Drugs”.

• [deejayqueue]

  “Drugs are really a product. And like a product, drugs can be made better with experimentation and honest evaluation, rather than stupid polemic polarization of ideology.”

  FTFY.

• [SKR]

  The increase is in REPORTED use of drugs. That means that more people are actually admitting to using drugs when asked. This is not a surprise. Most people are not going to admit to a survey taker that they committed a crime. Take the crime away and sure they’ll tell you they snorted coke last month.