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

3. Respect for and active perpetuation of things African: African life and African cultural
institutions.
4. Maintaining a standard of conduct of resolute and uncompromising resistance to all
things anti-African.
Together, the dimensions of ASC echo a common theme: ethnic con-sciousness engenders
group commitment. Regarding drug abuse, it is assumed that as a youth's ASC
decreases,his or her level of substance abuse is likely to increase. It is further assumed that
when an African-American youth does not internalize high ASC, he or she will probably
not be as concerned with eliminating the oppression that black people face and, thus, would
have little desire to advance black people politically, culturally, and economically. To the
extent that a youth is not conscious of the oppression of people of African descent, one may
be unaware of the manifold subtle and insidious ways the system of oppression maintains
control over African Americans. The over availability of illicit drugs and liquor stores in
many African-American communities probably would not be recognized by persons with
low ASC as a possible strategy to dominate and manipulate African Americans. Therefore,
youths with this mind-set may be at a greater risk of abusing substances because they lack
understanding of the political and economic function of substance abuse within the context
of oppression, as discussed earlier in this chapter. Moreover, persons with low ASC, as
opposed to those with high ASC, may be less likely to participate in black liberation
struggles and, therefore, may fail to acknowledge that substance abuse significantly
inhibits their ability to optimally contribute to these struggles.
Some evidence suggests that the ASC construct may help to explicate self-destructive
behaviors among African-American drug abusers. In the only study uncovered that has
examined the effects of ASC on African-American drug abusers, Dixon and Azibo (1998)
found that African-American male crack-cocaine users who had ASC scores that
represented a higher level of group commitment tended to participate less in exploitative
means to earn a living than those who had ASC scores that demon-strated lower levels of
African-American group commitment. Earning a living via exploitative means was defined
by the authors as participation in thefts, robberies, selling stolen goods, and hustling
people in licit and illicit ways. Although Dixon and Azibo did not examine whether lower
ASC places one at greater risk of using or abusing drugs, their findings are important in
that ASC may help to explain the variance in criminal behavior among African-American
crack cocaine users and abusers. Future research needs to explore the effects of ASC
orientation on African Americans who become drug abusers and those who do not. In the
Dixon and Azibo study, all of the subjects were drug abusers.
Although not using the ASC construct, Gary and Berry (1985) found a significant
relationship between awareness of racial oppression and attitudes about substance abuse
among 411 randomly sampled African Americans. Awareness that racial oppression was
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