The War on Drugs cover art

The War on Drugs

A History

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The War on Drugs

By: David Farber - editor
Narrated by: Barry Abrams
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About this listen

Fifty years after President Richard Nixon declared a "War on Drugs", the United States government has spent more than a trillion dollars fighting a losing battle. In recent years, about 1.5 million people have been arrested annually on drug charges - most of them involving cannabis - and nearly 500,000 Americans are currently incarcerated for drug offenses. Today, as a response to the dire human and financial costs, Americans are fast losing their faith that a war on drugs is fair, moral, or effective.

In a rare multifaceted overview of the underground drug market, featuring historical and ethnographic accounts of illegal drug production, distribution, and sales, The War on Drugs: A History examines how drug-war policies contributed to the making of the carceral state, racial injustice, regulatory disasters, and a massive underground economy. At the same time, the collection explores how aggressive anti-drug policies produced a "deviant" form of globalization that offered economically marginalized people an economic lifeline as players in a remunerative transnational supply and distribution network of illicit drugs.

©2022 New York University (P)2021 Tantor Americas History Law United States War

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All stars
Most relevant
But bad narration, the essays are all excellent in depth history of drug law enforcement from a US perspective. I learned a lot and I knew a lot about narcotics in the first place. Everyone in law enforcement should read and understand this and then just say no! To America and it’s devastating toll on the rest of the world with its coercive and pointless war on drugs.

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