Letter from the Editor

The HPR has a unique process for choosing covers topics. Before the selection meeting, staff and contributors submit proposals with a brief description of the topic and a list of potential articles. After a group discussion, we vote to narrow the field to the two or three best proposals, and then continue to vote until one garners a majority.  Typically, a handful of popular but unsuccessful proposals are resubmitted from previous issue cycles, and occasionally a proposal will linger for some time. This issue’s covers topic, “Fog of War: Drug Policy in America,” was a lingerer, losing to “Beyond Borders” last spring by one vote, and to “Urban America” last summer in a tiebreak, before finally winning out decisively this fall.
The two losses were the narrowest selections I have witnessed, and were more contentious than usual. I can understand why “Fog of War: Drug Policy in America” is controversial. Supporters felt it exemplified the characteristics of a good covers topic – coherency, a diversity of topics, and a dearth of media coverage. Opponents worried that a college publication would not be taken seriously on the issue, and insisted it was untimely. But something else also stirred unease; there was squeamishness at discussing U.S. drug policy. It was as if students worried that by choosing the topic, the HPR would be condoning the influence of drugs on the United States, or making light of the consequences of drug abuse. While neither could be further from the truth, these misconceptions unfortunately plague our country even more seriously than they did the HPR’s cover selection.
There are myriad reasons why the discourse on drug policy is so unsophisticated in the United States. Those who suffer the consequences of misguided drug policies are likely to be disenfranchised from the political process, including people with criminal records, the poor, and youth. The common presumption that anybody who supports drug policy reform is simply seeking easier access to his or her drug of choice only makes it more unlikely the issue will attract vocal advocates. And the most depressing part is that America’s imprudent drug laws do not just impact drug abusers and those convicted of drug crimes, but too often their families, friends, and neighbors as well.
What is needed, then, is for more Americans not directly affected by drug policy to reconsider the issue. A little time spent reading about the costs and ramifications of drug prohibition, the effectiveness of substituting treatment programs for incarceration, and the success of new methods for minimizing the social harms of drugs will go a long way. The covers section in this issue is an excellent starting point, and I hope it will motivate readers to continue to explore. I am confident that anybody who considers, for example, the tremendous success of Portugal’s decriminalization measures, or Switzerland’s experiment in prescribing heroin addicts their fix, will return to his or her thoughts on drug policy with a different outlook.
It is of course unreasonable to expect a surge of Americans to study the issue in this way. But there is already momentum behind reform, and if even a handful of informed individuals are willing to speak unabashedly about the dire need to revisit America’s drug policy, it will go a long way. It took three hours of discussion over seven months for the HPR, a group of college students disproportionately from California, Massachusetts, and New York, to come around on the seriousness of addressing U.S. drug policy. It will undoubtedly take the American electorate much longer, but I am confident that with effort, it eventually will.