Title: The Drug War as Race War
Headings: The following sections HAVE NOT moved yet:
Intersectionality, Worldwide and Other Pages


Content: The Reagan administration embraced a supply-reduction strategy focusing  on interdiction, seizure and criminal prosecution, rather than a  demand-reduction strategy that focused on public education and drug  treatment designed to reduce demand for illegal drugs. The  supply-reduction strategy adopted by the Reagan administration fits a  war model of the drug problem. Viewing the drug problem through a war  model implies that the perceived drug problem can be attacked through  aggressive law enforcement measures designed to seek out and destroy  contraband and interrupt distribution networks. These kinds of measures  are more analogous to the military tactics one would expect to see in  warfare than are demand-reduction measures, which are primarily social  service based. According to Michael Tonry, the drug war was 'fought largely from  partisan political motives to show that the Bush and Reagan  administrations were concerned about public safety, crime prevention,  and the needs of victims. ' While the drug war may have been initiated  out of political motives, this assessment does not tell the entire tale. To understand the origins of the War on Drugs in its entirety, we must  know what was going on in the cultural landscape that made it  politically advantageous to fight a war on drugs. When Reagan declared war on drugs, a broad cultural change was  underway in the United States. The country was moving from a period of  relative liberalism that included skepticism toward government and  authority and an emphasis on personal freedoms, to a period of relative  conservatism that included respect for government and authority and an  emphasis on personal responsibility. Reagan's very election to the  presidency was in large part a manifestation of this shift in attitudes.