Drug Law Reform and its Discontents: A Mixed-Methods Assessment of Drug Decriminalization in Mexico

Leo Beletsky, School of Law, Northeastern University will deliver the lecture

At a time of mounting global interest in reorienting drug laws and their enforcement towards public health principles, rigorous evaluation of such efforts remains sparse. In a 2009 “Narcomenudeo” law, Mexico decriminalized the possession of small amounts of drugs, instituting a drug treatment diversion scheme in lieu of incarceration. To evaluate reform implementation, we undertook a study of people who inject drugs (PWID) in Tijuana, Mexico–a locale where elevated levels of addiction and its related harms raise the stakes for this intervention’s positive impact. The study integrated a structured questionnaire with in-depth interviews assessing legal knowledge, police encounters, drug treatment history, and risk behaviors. Between 2010-2013, we recruited 737 adults; 32 participated in qualitative interviews. Only 81 (11%) respondents reported being aware of the reform’s formal provisions; virtually none experienced its operational components (e.g. having their drugs weighed, being diverted to treatment). Highlighting the deficit in the legitimacy of law enforcement institutions and professionals, 699 (98%) saw police practice as generally inconsistent with formal policy. Instead of treatment diversion, our multivariate analyses showed police encounters to be independently associated with known drug user risk behaviors, including syringe sharing and poly-drug use. Qualitative interviews underscored the limitations of policy reform in settings where citizens’ lived experience is substantially shaped by arbitrary policing practices rather than black letter law. As drug policy reforms gain global momentum, ancillary structural interventions to improve fidelity are needed to assure their public health benefit. Police training and management approaches currently underway in response to this study’s findings will be discussed.

Beletsky, L., Wagner, K. D., Arredondo, J., Palinkas, L., Rodríguez, C. M., Kalic, N., & Strathdee, S. A. (2015). Implementing Mexico’s “Narcomenudeo” Drug Law Reform A Mixed Methods Assessment of Early Experiences Among People Who Inject Drugs. Journal of Mixed Methods Research, 1558689815575862.

Strathdee, S. A., Arredondo, J., Rocha, T., Abramovitz, D., Rolon, M. L., Mandujano, E. P., … & Beletsky, L. (2015). A police education programme to integrate occupational safety and HIV prevention: protocol for a modified stepped-wedge study design with parallel prospective cohorts to assess behavioural outcomes. BMJ open, 5(8), e008958.