BOOK REVIEW: "DRUG WAR CRIMES"

Reviewed by Stephen Young

"Drug War Crimes: The Consequences of Prohibition" by Jeffrey Miron, The
Independent Institute, 109 page, $15.95

Prohibitionists and anti-prohibitionists may not be able to agree on much,
but we can probably all endorse the idea that the war on drugs creates
consequences.

More difficult to reconcile is the question of whether those consequences
are positive or negative. As a fervent anti-prohibitionist, it seems clear
to me that the consequences are overwhelmingly negative. Week after week,
while skimming through hundreds of news stories about the drug war to put
this newsletter together, the conclusion is inescapable.

Whether you measure it ruined lives, wasted resources or lost rights, the
cost of the drug war appears extreme with little payout on the other
side. But no, say the prohibitionists. Drug problems would be magnified
manyfold and we would become a drooling, spaced-out, uncaring society, were
it not for the restraining force of drug prohibition.

There's so many ways to respond to the prohibitionists, it's difficult
determining where to start. Economics professor Jeffrey A. Miron does a
service in his new book "Drug War Crimes: The Consequences of Prohibition,"
by cutting straight to the heart of the matter in a slim, readable volume.

In the book, Miron tackles two crucial questions:

1.) How much, if at all, does prohibition lower drug use?

2.) How much, if at all, does prohibition increase violence?

As you might expect, the basic answers offered by Miron are 1.) probably
very little and 2.) almost certainly a whole lot.

From there, the author weighs the relative benefits of lowered drug use
versus increased violence and and other costs. He concludes that
legalization is preferable to prohibition. He then goes a step further, a
step which might make some drug policy reform advocates a bit
uncomfortable. Looking at reform policies that stop short of outright
legalization, like decriminalization, or even selective legalization for
marijuana only, Miron argues that full legalization represents the best
alternative.

This is an interesting contrast to "Drug War Heresies," a book published a
couple of years ago which also claimed to weigh the pros and cons of
prohibition. The authors of that book (which was reviewed in DrugSense
Weekly - see http://www.drugsense.org/dsw/2002/ds02.n234.html#sec5 )
expressed a tepid preference for mild reforms, while clearly rejecting full
legalization.

Miron's "Drug War Crimes" acknowledges that mild reforms are preferable to
strict prohibition, but explains why legalization is the best option
available. The author's libertarian perspective is clearly stated near the
end of the book, even as it bundled in the language of economics.

"American tradition should make legalization - i.e. liberty - the preferred
policy, barring compelling evidence prohibition generates benefits in
excess of its costs," Miron writes.

"Drug War Crimes" doesn't address the political realities that make full
legalization a huge long-shot at this point in time in the United
States. However, by the end of the book, any consequences of legalization
seem far less radical than the masochistic downward spiral of damage that
is the war on drugs.