Drug Decriminalization in Maryland Through an African Centered Research Paradigm- Analysis and Recommendations

Moreover, the frame of the decriminalization argument, which centers public health, locks
in a politics of scientific expertise which itself reflects a focus on “objective”, quantitative science,
a spiritual reasoning critiqued in Part I. The quote from Domosławski cites numerous international
treaties, Nobel Laureates, and prominent non profit institutions. This can be read as an attempt to
launder a seemingly radical idea of drug decriminalization through borrowing the institutional
credibility of these institutions. While understandable as a tactic, this process has limitations as it
limits the frame for the forms of evidence that are “admissible” under this frame. Rather than
expanding the discursive framework to allow “subjugated knowledge” to come to the fore, as
Schiele states, the report seeks to recenter the reader within dominant notions of scientific
respectability. This creates a premium on truth claims which meet the characteristics of eurocentric
research outlined by Schiele - reductive, quantitative, centered on visual analysis of the discrete
phenomenon, rather than the more spiritual and comprehensive forms of research advocated by
the African Centered Research Paradigms. More directly, the report isolates a political theory of
change, which can be seen as stemming from the assumptions guiding the research. The report
argues explicitly that the decriminalization movement is being led by a coalition of “ scientists,
health practitioners, drug users, policymakers, and law enforcement officials.” The idea that drug
users and law enforcement officers could be locked in an antagonistic relationship, or a relationship
drought with centuries of racialized violence, is completely absent from the analysis. Pointedly, it
ignores the public safety risks that continue to justify racialized violence even in the face of an
attempted shift to public health.
It might be more precise to say it assumes what public health is for whites is what it would
be for racial minorities, despite the continuous realizations that for racialized minorities public
health itself has been used as a tool for racialized social control. Rail and Jette use the concept of
“biocitizenship” to frame how public health discourses are deployed to justify racialized visions
of “unworthy” biological subjects unable to effectively manage their health through proper
internalization of discipline; and thus, need experts to inculcate proper biological morality into
them for their own good. They write:
Biomorality thus corresponds to the moral demand to be happy and healthy. Biomorality
engenders biocitizens. Following Foucault, Rose and Novas (2005) argue that biocitizens
are “made up” from above (by medical and legal authorities, public health professionals,
insurance companies, etc.), but they also make themselves. Active biocitizens inform
themselves and live responsibly, adjusting lifestyle and all areas of their physical and
social environments so as to maximize health. But those who made up biocitizens and
virtuous sub-populations also contrast them to dangerous Others. These are the weakwilled,
the lazy, the amoral, the unruly, those who do not live responsibly and engage in
“risky” behavior or do not get involved in preventive behavior, in brief, those who are
“made up” as domestic bioterrorists who exploit the tax-supported institutions that
produce health and well-being. We call these individuals “bio-Others” (Rail, 2011) as the
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