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

conducive to aggressive, heavy-handed War on Drugs policing (Martinez and Lee, 2020). It might
be useful for researchers to look through this data dump and see if there is any relevant information
pertaining to Maryland. Moreover, no account of War on Drugs policing in Maryland would be
complete without an in depth analysis of the machinations around Baltimore’s Gun Trace Task
Force, which used the War on Drugs’ delegitimation of street level drug sellers as leverage to
violently attack and rob drug dealers, themselves becoming drug traffickers and engaging in other
forms of violence against the citizens of Baltimore (Lopez, 2018). Viewing the Gun Trace Task
Force not as the machinations of a few rogue cops, but as the interactions of the power imbalance
between the community and the police force, helps to clarify how having a more “expansive
research frame on police statutory authority,” as Woods recommends, might look within the
context of an Afrocentric research paradigm. This would mean analysis of drug decriminalization
must include analysis of civilian oversight institutions, including the limitations of their oversight
capacities because of legal obstacles such as the Maryland Law Enforcement Officer’s Bill of
Rights. This would also require understanding drug prohibition as what John Pfaff describes as a
comprehensively broken legal system with several structural factors beyond the War on Drugs
which must be addressed in order to challenge the perverse incentive towards over-policing,
overproduction, overcharging, and the lack of support for public defenders. Researchers would do
well to engage his critique of the “standard model” explanation for hyper incarceration, centered
on an over-focus on the War on Drugs and “nonviolent drug offenders,” as it will be a useful
starting point for expanding frames of analysis for research on drug decriminalization.
Given the uniqueness of the American criminal legal system and our analysis of the
limitations of the Portuguese model, researchers should be dubious of claims that data from other
nations can serve as sufficient proof of the efficacy of drug decriminalization. Not only because of
the role of structural racism and anti-Blackness in America, but because of the clear difference in
medial infrastructure for the poor. Illustrated by the fact that America is one of the few
industrialized nations which still does not offer a guarantee of some basic form of universal health
care for its population. This does not, however, mean that other nations' experiences are not useful
places for research. An African-centered research paradigm would advocate for an increased focus
on nations which more accurately mirror the United States in their racial dynamics, such as Brazil
and South Africa. While these nations are typically ignored in decriminalization literature, both
have court rulings on cannabis decriminalization. Which, according to many, are typically not
enforced on the ground, have nascent legalization movements facing pushback, and are not linked
to larger social justice movements, both of which may serve as a necessary cautionary tale for the
efficiency of decriminalization in the United States (Nel, 2018; Veit, 2019).
It is within the methodology of institutional analysis and assessing community capacity
that we can offer suggestions on how to answer a critical research question in more detail: how
exactly does one define decriminalization. As previously stated, the standard model has an
4151 Park Heights Avenue, Suite 207, Baltimore, MD 21215 • www.lbsbaltimore.com • (410) 374-7683