This paper analyses the relationship between drug-related detentions for possession or petty dealing and drug-related violence. Two theoretical mechanisms are explored: (i) when a dealer is detained, the market is disrupted, and competition increases; (ii) when a consumer is detained, other consumers are deterred and seek new dealers, generating competition among groups and, consequently, increasing violence. These hypotheses are quantitatively evaluated using geocoded data from local San Luis...

A decade ago, cannabis reform was on the public and political agenda in Chile, but the reform process eventually broke down with no marijuana legalization. This article focuses on the different stages of agenda politics to explain the reasons for the failure of cannabis reform in Chile. Drawing on original data, including 36 interviews with key actors, the article traces the reform process. Through a combination of process tracing and counterfactual analysis, the article establishes the causal...

The present study offers an outlook on the current situation of civil society organizations (CSOs) in the field of harm reduction in Mexico. Analyzing Mexican harm reduction civil society organizations (HRCSOs) is necessary for three reasons: because they have historically represented a sensible alternative to drug policy proposals that emanate from the logic of the State; because they have the organizational and cognitive potential and the legitimacy to protect illicit substance users (with or...

Resumen Entre 2017 y 2021 se duplicó la cantidad de mujeres acusadas de delincuencia organizada en México y, actualmente, este es el delito más común entre mujeres privadas de la libertad en centros de reclusión federales. Sin embargo, los análisis académicos acerca de mujeres acusadas por este delito son todavía marginales. Y los pocos estudios existentes sobre este tipo penal tienden a ignorar el género de la persona acusada....

Purpose. Between 2006 and 2012, Mexico implemented a “frontal war against organized crime”. This strategy increased criminal violence and triggered negative consequences across the country’s economic, political and social spheres. This study aims to analyse how the magnitude and visibility of criminal violence impact the housingmarket ofMexico City. Design/methodology/approach – The authors used different violent proxies to measure the effect of the magnitude and...

Desde el discurso gubernamental y la literatura especializada, se ha postulado que el Cártel Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG) es una de las redes criminales más poderosas en México, tanto en términos territoriales como en económicos. Con el objetivo de conocer cómo opera en el territorio la economía del Cártel y sus alcances regionales, desarrollamos una metodología mixta. Ésta incluye trabajo de campo...

Este estudio cualitativo presenta los resultados de una encuesta no representativa realizada a personas con un familiar privado de la libertad en México. El objetivo fue entender cómo las principales medidas adoptadas por las autoridades para mitigar contagios dentro de los reclusorios afectaron a familiares que cuidan de las personas encarceladas. La encuesta recibió 234 respuestas que fueron procesadas en el software R (R, 2022). Si bien los resultados no son...

Este artículo en el Washington International Law Journal explora y desarrolla un amplio conjunto de argumentos que demuestran la inconstitucionalidad de las políticas de prohibición de drogas en México. Algunos de estos argumentos se han utilizado para validar los usos recreativos y terapéuticos de la marihuana, mientras que otros siguen sin utilizarse ni explorarse. Existen más de diez marcos constitucionales que sirven para evaluar la...

More than 77,000 people have disappeared in Mexico since the beginning of the war on drugs, but very little is known about them. After analyzing the descriptions of a non-randomized sample of disappearance registries from governmental data, we find that those events associated with organized crime are better understood by analyzing four factors: migration to the U.S. border and traveling on highways, gender differences and individual vs. multiple-victim disappearances, the forced recruitment of...

Abstract This article explores the military's use of deadly force in contemporary Mexico. Annually, roughly 50,000 soldiers patrol the streets in the context of the ‘war on drugs', which began in 2006 and continues to this day. How many people have the military killed, detained, or injured during ‘police operations'? The information about what the military do has been concealed for years. Recently, after years of secrecy, the military made these facts public. We...

Summary Why and how do information and communication technologies (ICTs) shape the intensity of rebel violence? Recent studies find that ICTs can both increase and decrease such violence. We argue that, during civil wars, this effect depends on the type of ICTs. Mobile phones give rebels better military coordination to organize violence. In contrast, the internet increases the constraints of rebel groups to use violence. On the one hand, the internet increases the visibility of rebel groups...

Abstract The objective of this text is to describe the three categories that the Drug Policy Program at the Center for Teaching and Research in Economics (CIDE-PPD) database comprises, their limitations, and their main features. Additionally, we explain what we believe to be the source of the database we originally received and analyze its accuracy by comparing it with public records. We describe the validation and codification processes the database was subjected to, as well as the main...

Abstract For over a decade, the Mexican government has invested itself in a “frontal attack” on drug trafficking organizations with catastrophic results. Little to nothing has been gained in limiting drug production, use, or trafficking, while violence has skyrocketed and major institutional and human rights crises have evolved. Through a multidisciplinary approach—which includes history, sociology, policy analysis, and constitutional doctrine—this essay evaluates...

Abstract Background Research has shown the substantial impact on mental health for victims of drug-related crime in Mexico, especially individuals who have been heavily exposed to violence. However, the effect of drug-related violence in non-victims has been less studied because causal pathways via indirect violence are more ambiguous. We argue that drug-related violence does have an influence on the mental health of non-victims: For example, because of how violence is publicized...

Summary Background As countries embark on public health-oriented drug law reform, health impact evaluations are needed. In 2012, Mexico mandated the narcomenudeo reform, which depenalised the possession of small amounts of drugs and instituted drug treatment instead of incarceration. We investigated the past and future effect of this drug law reform on HIV incidence in people who inject drugs in Tijuana, Mexico. Methods In this epidemic modelling study, we used data from the El...

Resumen El objetivo planteado es entender mejor las prácticas concretas de las fuerzas públicas en el contexto de la “guerra contra las drogas” durante el periodo de 2006 a 2011. Para ello, se analizó la subbase “Combates” publicada por el Programa de Política de Drogas del cide. El texto ofrece un análisis estadístico-descriptivo de los datos allí contenidos e identifica dos principales tendencias en las...

Abstract Public policies are supposed to be transitory measures meant to faceand solve public problems. Constitutional design, by contrast, involves per-manent decisions adopted to rule the inner workings of the polity and itsgovernment. Although policy is most often imagined as transitory and con-stitutional law as permanent, some policy decisions reconfigure constitu-tional design permanently. This Article proposes a new analytic frameworkfor rendering visible and understanding the...

ABSTRACT Several previous studies have found that interventions by security forces against criminal organisations result in increased violence related to organised crime. However, much less is known about how and why this effect occurs. Our study not only identifies the causal mechanisms that explain this outcome, but also evaluates the empirical validity of these mechanisms. Employing a novel data set, we find that following security-force intervention, the number of criminal...

Some researchers suggest that the observed boom in the levels of violence in Mexico since 2008 are a consequence of placing federal military forces in states with a significant organized crime presence. However, little has been said about the role of the changeable, competitive, and violent nature of criminal organizations on this increasing violence. Using the literature on inter- and intra-state conflicts as matter of analogy to explain organized crime developments in Mexico, fragmentation...

Abstract This article compares the official and the widely held discourses about drug traffickers in Mexico’s current War against Drugs. The federal government has obliquely distorted the distinction between a criminal and an enemy, dehumanizing drug traffickers and, thus, opening up a spectrum of tolerance for the repressive actions carried out by the authorities against drug traffickers. Inadvertently, however, official discourse has also politicized and empowered drug...

ABSTRACT Drug-related homicides in Mexico have increased to levels never before seen and organised crime has evolved accordingly, becoming more fragmented and diverse. This work analyses the evolution of organised crime and drug-related violence in Mexico by examining how drug trafficking organisations (DTOs) communicate through the messages left next to executed bodies from 2007 to 2011. Results suggest that the use of narcomessages has changed and developed in parallel with...

Abstract In September, 2015, the member states of the UN endorsed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for 2030, which aspire to human-rights-centred approaches to ensuring the health and wellbeing of all people. The SDGs embody both the UN Charter values of rights and justice for all and the responsibility of states to rely on the best scientific evidence as they seek to better humankind. In April, 2016, these same states will consider control of illicit drugs, an area of social policy...

Abstract El texto busca ofrecer un marco analítico y comparativo para estudiar en detalle un fenómeno que hasta hoy ha pasado prácticamente inadvertido: los costos constitucionales de la guerra contra las drogas. En las Américas, las políticas públicas adoptadas en un esfuerzo por suprimir los mercados de drogas ilícitas, han requerido o justificado reformas legales y transformaciones institucionales sustantivas. Estos escenarios son...

ABSTRACT This paper attempts to identify the existence of displacement in Mexico caused by drug-related violence. We identify two types of migrants: (i) migrants moving from nonviolent to violent states, driven by better economic opportunities and less expensive cost of living at destination and (ii) migrants moving from violent to nonviolent states: they still migrate even if the cost of living at destination is more expensive and economic opportunities are lower. Our hypothesis is...

Resumen Este texto muestra cómo la aplicación de castigos penales en México afecta de manera desproporcionada a un sector específico de la sociedad: hombres jóvenes provenientes de sectores marginados. Asimismo, analiza la relación entre el uso de este tipo de castigos y el incumplimiento del derecho, y sugiere que al estigmatizar y excluir a ofensores (o presuntos ofensores) provenientes de un determinado grupo social, las penas de prisión...

Abstract Debido al escaso conocimiento sobre los resultados del uso de la fuerza en enfrentamientos entre presuntos miembros de la delincuencia organizada y la Policía Federal, el Ejército y la Marina, el artículo presenta el saldo en materia de muertos, heridos y detenidos de 2008 a 2011, a partir de dos fuentes: reportes de prensa y datos de la Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional. Se muestra que el índice de letalidad del Ejército se ha elevado...