Deconstructing prohibitionist ideology: A sociocognitive approach to understand opinions on UK drug policy and the law

Abstract

BackgroundThere is increasing support to include people who use drugs (PWUD) into debates about drug policy reform in order to improve policy legitimacy and outcomes. The aim of this paper is thus to critically analyse the perspectives of PWUD on UK drug policy and the law. This is the first empirical study to apply the four philosophical positions that underpin drug policy debates: Millian liberalism, legal moralism, strict libertarianism and paternalism (MacCoun and Reuter, 2001) to understand opinions and ideology. MethodsForty interviews were conducted with PWUD about the meaning of and motivation for their substance consumption and about their opinions on drug policy and the law. The responses were analysed using the sociocognitive approach pioneered by van Dijk 2014; 2015 from the field of critical discourse studies. The analysis involved connecting personal experiences, knowledge and opinions to broader values, attitudes and ideology, specifically the analysis focused upon the extent to which participants challenged or supported prohibitionist ideology. ResultsThe opinions of those PWUD studied were diverse and complex. There was some support for prohibition, but overwhelmingly there was resistance and challenge to it. We theorise the challenge to prohibitionist ideology on a continuum from anti-prohibition to pro-reform. Key themes from the analysis included: knowledge gaps regarding terminology; uncertainty about and lack of consideration of policy and reform; political dissonance; apprehension about public attitudes and behaviours; reform rooted in social welfare and human rights ideology; and apathy through counterculture. ConclusionThe findings demonstrate a lack of clarity amongst some PWUD regarding drug policy and reform. Educational initiatives outlining the different reform approaches would therefore provide PWUD with invaluable knowledge and help facilitate their engagement into reform debates. Despite a lack of clarity and consistency within opinions, participants were united in their discussion of human rights, health, economics and education; therefore these topics could help frame future approaches that seek to include PWUD into debates about drug policy.

Positive drug stories: possibilities for agency and positive subjectivity for harm reduction

“…PWUD have been increasingly included within the practices of drug-use regulation, by being enabled to distribute health and harm reduction information (Lafferty et al 2017). However, there is as yet little sense that they are seen as policy participants (Askew and Bone 2019;also Stevens 2019) which, itself, continues to constitute a stigmatization of PWUD to whom drug policy is applied, rather than being co-produced as is now common in other fields of social policy.…”

Doing autoethnographic drugs research: Some notes from the field

“…It is part reflexive commentary and part methodological 'instruction manual', and its ultimate goal is to contribute something meaningful to the scholarly community of drugs researchers about the ways in which thinking about themselves and their drug use (past or present) can enhance their professional practice. At the time of writing, progressive policy work is underway around including the voices of people who use drugs in drug policy debates, as well as conversations beginning to emerge around the drug use of drugs researcher (see Askew and Bone (2019), Ross (2020), Harris (2015), and then Ross et al (2020) and Wakeman (2014) respectively). Thus, the present article seeks to offer something of a bridge between these two developments by engaging critically and analytically with the use of autoethnography -the ethnographic exploration of the self -in drugs research.…”

Hidden and uninterested populations: Methodological insights and unresolved issues from the study of Cannabis Social Clubs

“…Ritter et al (2018) highlight the importance of creating space and opportunity for the co-production of knowledge, by focusing on the process of participation, and scrambling the divisions between experts and laypersons, in order for new knowledge to emerge to identify drug policy problems and solutions. To avoid tokenistic consultation, Askew and Bone (2019) similarly reflect on the participatory process itself through adopting a sociocognitive approach (SCA) when analyzing their participant interviews on drug policy reform. Spending more time in the field with CSCs could likewise facilitate deeper insights into the clubs’ values and ideologies and the extent to which CSCs and their members internalize and/or challenge prohibition ideology.…”

“…Spending more time in the field with CSCs could likewise facilitate deeper insights into the clubs’ values and ideologies and the extent to which CSCs and their members internalize and/or challenge prohibition ideology. Indeed, asking CSCs to choose their preferred policy approach could be reductive/prescriptive since Askew and Bone (2019) found that the perspectives of people who use drugs on drug policy and the law can be diverse, complex, and that clarity surrounding regulatory options is needed. Since drug policy making invariably involves questions of values as well as evidence (MacCoun and Reuter, 2001), a meaningful participatory approach would require more time spent in the field (as was the case in S6, for instance).…”

“…Since drug policy making invariably involves questions of values as well as evidence (MacCoun and Reuter, 2001), a meaningful participatory approach would require more time spent in the field (as was the case in S6, for instance). This could involve interweaving drug policy discussion with personal narratives, which could shape the public’s perception of cannabis and subsequently influence policy (Askew and Bone, 2019). For instance, in S6, an in-depth, unstructured interview was conducted by Bone interviewing Greg de Hoedt—the Chair of the United Kingdom’s Cannabis Social Clubs (a CSC Federation)—the subsequent article was co-edited and co-created by both authors to input de Hoedt’s experiential knowledge into the “expert” evidence base (Bone & de Hoedt, 2018).…”