University of Victoria

From a criminal approach to a health-oriented approach: Drug regulation in Canada

Moving from justice to health regulation, cannabis dispensaries and harm reduction strategies have become a topic of major interest in recent scholarship. Within this framework, human rights now constitute an important aspect of the drug policy agenda and where, for example, governments have started considering drug dependence differently, shifting from a criminal approach to a health-oriented one. Another example can be seen in the fundamental paradox of a patient's right to choose their own treatment and the state's right to regulate it. It seems clear these policies, primarily based on law enforcement and punishment, are outdated and that new responses need to be found to tackle these issues. The objective of this panel discussion is to comment upon new drug policy trends, particularly touching upon both health and regulation (law), and to propose ways improve these policies.

Session Chair: Connie Carter, University of Victoria

Session Organizer: Jenna Valleriani, University of Toronto, jenna.valleriani@utoronto.ca

The programs and logics of harm reduction: the production and regulation of drug using subjects

Marc Sinclair, York University, marcsin@yorku.ca

This presentation is inspired by the recent Supreme Court of Canada decision that permits Insite – a supervised injection facility for intravenous drug users – to stay open by mandating a federal exemption from the Canadian Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. On its face, the Supreme Court’s judgment tacitly reinforces the idea that harm reductionist philosophies and practices endorsed by Insite, and other like-minded organizations, are necessarily more effective than earlier prohibitionist approaches. One of the effects of this positioning is the creation of a drug management dichotomy, framed in either or terms, where prohibition becomes understood as inherently punitive and harm reduction as inherently progressive.

This presentation intervenes into this dichotomous framing of drug management strategies by problematizing the way that harm reduction is valorized when juxtaposed with the prohibitionist policy school. Using a loosely Foucauldian lens and drawing on interviews with drug users, police, politicians, healthcare professionals and program coordinators in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, this paper has three objectives: to evaluate the harm reduction complex on its own terms, to explicate three competing logics or rationalities within the harm reduction complex as a strategy of government, and to discuss the potential of drug user participation regarding drug policies as a way of moving forward.

Wednesday June 5, 2013 08:45 AM - 10:15 AM Building: Elliott Building, Room: E-160

Implications of normalization for Canadian drug policy: Views of "risk" and "harm" held by socially integrated, adult, regular cannabis users in 4 provinces

Patricia Erickson, University of Toronto, pat.erickson@utoronto.ca

The normalization of cannabis use in Canada is usually presented as a concern in relation to youthful consumers, but more generally has important implications for drug policy, law enforcement and public health. In the context of ongoing total prohibition, the aim of this research was to determine the extent and expression of normalization in Canada with respect to adult cannabis use, and users’ views about the potential imposition of criminal penalties in contrast to potential concerns about health. Our research used a modified version of Respondent Driving Sampling to derive a sample of 165 adult, socially integrated, regular users of cannabis only (n=97) or both tobacco and cannabis (n=68) from 4 cities: Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal and Halifax. Our findings reveal important distinctions between the socially and culturally mediated sense of “risk” and the more narrowly grounded perceptions of “harm” based in one’s own and peer group experiences. Users’ estimates of health impacts indicated some short term concerns, and some steps to mitigate these, but also marked intentions to continue use for the next decade. This unique data set can help to inform public debates about cannabis policy and provide guidance for harm reduction.

Wednesday June 5, 2013 08:45 AM - 10:15 AM Building: Elliott Building, Room: E-160

Establishing a basis of expertise in medical marijuana: Compassion clubs as embodied health movement organizations

Rebecca Penn, Dalla Lana School of Public Health University of Toronto, rebecca.penn@utoronto.ca

Compassion clubs offer a model of community-based medical marijuana dispensaries as holistic and cost-effective alternatives to Health Canada’s centralized model. But despite this, the federal government has not adopted this model nor made any changes to the legal status of compassion clubs. That clubs continue to operate (albeit illegally) reflects their success in achieving legitimacy and credibility.

By examining compassion clubs as embodied health movement (EHM) organizations, we see how they have simultaneously challenged, and collaborated with, scientific and medical professionals to expand the understanding of, and therapeutic use of, marijuana. Their engagement with the academic, scientific, medical, and political worlds has helped establish their cultural and cognitive authority. Compassion clubs have also affected the social construction of its members, reframing their shared “deviant” identity to one that is more positive.

Here, I argue that compassion clubs have established a basis of expertise in medical marijuana that has become increasingly accepted in Canada, despite Health Canada’s resistance. Viewing them through the framework of embodied health movements reveals how compassion clubs have established this expertise, and how they can facilitate the development of a meaningful and effective medical marijuana program in Canada.

Wednesday June 5, 2013 08:45 AM - 10:15 AM Building: Elliott Building, Room: E-160

Doing the same ‘illicit’ drug policy over and over again and expecting a different result: A pragmatic and evidence-based alternative to Canada’s ‘insane’ prohibitionist approach

Gregory Brown, Carleton University, gregoryr_brown@carleton.ca

Einstein’s definition of insanity characterizes Canadian ‘illicit’ drug policies for now over fifty years. Some individuals in Canadian society alter their consciousness by ingesting substances legitimized and condoned by the state (such as alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, and medications obtained by prescription) while other Canadians prefer to use substances that the state has chosen to prohibit and in doing so risk criminal censure and penal consequences. Despite massive expenditures of tax revenues and criminal justice resources while approaching this social reality within the criminal law framework the use of designated illegal substances in Canadian society has not been extinguished nor even substantially deterred. Can anyone credibly argue that Canadian society is better today than in 1961 (when the Narcotic Control Act was introduced) in relation to the social consequences of ‘illicit’ drug use?

This paper exposes the devastating social consequences of moral/deontological prohibitionist criminalization policies and the inadequacy of ‘band-aid’ harm reduction approaches as it argues for the de-exceptionalizing of ‘illicit’ drugs and advocates in favour of a regulatory approach to substance use that implicates legalization and a health-based paradigm shift. The theoretical frameworks through which this discussion is engaged intertwine the principles of legal moralism and penal abolition/moderation. The approach proposed in this paper will cease the marginalization and stigmatization of large numbers of individuals in our society, restore dignity to those individuals struggling with addictions, ensure safer and less criminogenic communities, and recognize the proper jurisdictional situating of the exercise of free will and potentially self-injurious conduct.

Wednesday June 5, 2013 08:45 AM - 10:15 AM Building: Elliott Building, Room: E-160