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

“The mysterious transformation of ordinary people into drug addicts urgently requires
explanation. Fortunately, addiction is well suited to theoretical analysis because it refers
to a single recognisable phenomenon, whatever drug is involved, including alcohol.
Unfortunately, however, analysis of addiction is hindered by the secretiveness of addicts,
because drug addictions are socially abhorrent or illegal. People in this situation have
many reasons to lie to authorities. It is perhaps for this reason that theories of addiction
are so often drawn from research on laboratory rats, an aspect of current scholarship
that—I predict—future generations will find hilarious…
Since the 19th century, however, the conventional wisdom has consistently viewed
addiction as maladaptive and explained it with malign hidden causes like loss of will power
to ‘addictive drugs’, unconscious fixations of the libido, deficiencies in the brain reward
system, neural sensitisation to the reinforcing effects of drugs, and genes for addiction—
or some combination of these. But theories based on these hidden causes have failed to
generate either a generally believable account of addiction or anything more than
marginally effective forms of therapy. A reasonable conclusion after more than a century
of frustrated searching for the hidden underlying disorder is that it does not exist. Addiction
is, in fact, not maladaptive for growing numbers of people under the dislocating conditions
of our era. There is no underlying disorder. Although only dislocated people become
addicted, many severely dislocated people
live and die in ways that cannot be called ‘addiction’ without stretching the word too thin.
Many of them ‘get by’ by dint of admirable resolution and a little help from their friends.
Others may become depressed, suicidal, apathetic, murderous, or mentally erratic, rather
than addicted. Thus, dislocation is a necessary, but not sufficient, cause of addiction.
As psychosocial integration is a fundamental human need, and free-market society, by its
nature, produces mass dislocation at all times (not just during times of collapse), and as
addiction is the predominant way of adapting to dislocation, addiction is endemic and
spreading fast. Free-market society can no more be addiction-free than it can be free of
intense competition, income disparity, environmental destruction, unequal access to lifesaving
medical care, or dishonest business practices. There can be no ‘technical fix’ or
‘market solution’ for problems that are built into the structure of society itself. Instead,
today’s society must either modify its free-market structure enough to keep its side effects
under control or watch these side effects continue to spread.” (Alexander, Bruce, 2010).
Ani explains how social science reflects a technocentric vision of material progress, and Alexander
explains how our contemporary addiction crisis is linked to the loss of psychosocial integration
this “free market society” produces. If this is true, it is essential that we not use the scientific
4151 Park Heights Avenue, Suite 207, Baltimore, MD 21215 • www.lbsbaltimore.com • (410) 374-7683