Released today: new Count the Costs briefing on the crime costs of the war on drugs

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This below is reproduced from the Count the Costs blog.

Far from eliminating drug use and the illicit trade,prohibition has inadvertently fuelled the development of the world’s largestillegal commodities market – a market worth hundreds of billions of dollars,controlled solely by criminal profiteers. Produced in collaboration withproject supporters Law Enforcement AgainstProhibition, Transform Drug PolicyFoundation, Release, theInternational Centre for Science in Drug Policy and Harm Reduction International, the latest Countthe Costs briefing outlines how this illicit, unregulated market generates:

• Organised crime
• Street crime
• Mass incarceration
• Violent crime
• Crimes perpetrated by governments/states
• Vast economic costs in terms of drug war-related enforcement

Thebriefing will form a key part of our outreach to mainstream NGOsworking in the criminal justice sector, building on the endorsements Count theCosts has already received from organisations such as the Howard League for Penal Reform and Make Justice Work.

Evidence from across the world reveals that although lawenforcement can show seemingly impressive results in terms of arrests andseizures, impacts on the drug market are inevitably marginal, localised andtemporary. Indeed, as the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimeacknowledges, one of the unintended consequences of the war on drugs is theso-called “balloon effect”, whereby rather than eliminating criminal activity,enforcement just moves it somewhere else. When enforcement does take outcriminals, it also creates a vacuum, and even more violence, as rival gangsfight for control.

The Count the Costs initiative has the widely shared goal ofa safer, healthier and more just world. It is time for all sectors affected bycurrent approaches to drugs, particularly those agencies, organisations andindividuals concerned with crime reduction, to call on governments and the UNto Count the Costs of the war on drugs and explore the alternatives.