The war on drugs is a war on children

There have been two publications in the past week or so that have struck me as profound evidence that the war on drugs is an utter failure. Let me say up front, I see addiction as a health issue.

The first report is from The National Academies and is a report titled, The growth of incarceration in the United States: Exploring causes and consequences.  It points out that the USA incarcerates more people than any other country in the world and that drug issues are the prime reason.  The report concludes:

The change in penal policy over the past four decades nay have had a wide range of unwanted social costs, and the magnitude of crime reduction benefits is highly uncertain (p.7)

The report also brings into question mandatory minimum sentences and long sentences. They note that incarceration is used when there are less intrusive and more beneficial options.  If imprisonment is not reducing crime, then why use it as the prime response pattern. Insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.

The second report comes from the London School of Economics titled Ending the drug wars. It concludes:

The pursuit of a militarised and enforcement-led global ‘war on drugs’ strategy has produced enormous negative outcomes and collateral damage. These include mass incarceration in the US, highly repressive policies in Asia, vast corruption and political destabilisation in Afghanistan and West Africa, immense violence in Latin America, an HIV epidemic in Russia, an acute global shortage of pain medication and the propagation of systematic human rights abuses around the world. 

These reports tells us that, despite over 40 years of prohibition and interaction as the prime social policy approach for which literally billions of dollars have been spent, we have not been successful in even reducing the problem. The LSE report notes that prices have been falling while purity has been increasing.

What neither of these reports talk about directly is the impact that the prohibition approach has on children:

1. When a parent is incarcerated, the child essentially loses the parent. When incarceration is for long periods, then the child must go through a grieving process that leaves the child with an emotional hole. As the Adverse Childhood Experiences research shows, incarceration of a parent has long term impacts;
2. The child is more likely to exposed to violence when a parent has an active addiction as the parent must go through illegal channels;
3. The family system lives in fear when the addiction is present but health resources are seriously underfunded;
4. Incarcerating a parent is more likely to impact the child's economic survival;
5. More chance of being brought into care

We also know that untreated addiction has long lasting impacts on a child. Thus, if we shift our focus to one where health resources are enhanced, then the impact on children will be more intact families and more present parents. As well, rehabilitation is likely to be much less expensive.

More evidence against increasing incarcerations

In the past, I have written about child protection issues that arise from a parent being incarcerated. These problems include fracturing family functioning, increasing the economic and social burden on the family and resulting in stresses that can then lead to neglect and other forms of maltreatment. Certainly, a case can be made that the needs of society may over ride those concerns, particularly with violent and repeat offenders. Thus, a new study by the PEW Centre on the States offers some fresh and articulate focus on the possible costs and benefits of incarceration.

The study, titled, Time Served, The high costs, low return of longer prison sentences, concludes that for a substantial number of offenders, "there is little or no evidence that keeping them locked up longer prevents additional crime" (p.4). That is a fairly significant conclusion particularly given the very high costs associated with incarceration. They also note that the public has become less focused on punishment and more focused on cost effectiveness and the use of tools to reduce recidivism. Good risk assessment can determine who is best for release and supervision.

The impact for families is not really measured in this work. But one also has to wonder what impact that children might have by a parent whose involvement with the criminal justice system is more focused on helping the parent address mental health or addiction issues. What lessons are there for the child? A society that supports positive change or one that is focused on punishment.

Consider that between 1990 and 2010, the US prison population grew by 109% at an average cost of around $24,000 per prisoner. They estimate that the extra time served without benefit is costing the US about $10 billion.

The argument is not about the violent offender who is likely to repeat his/her crime. It is about carefully determining who belongs in prison because reform will be unlikely to succeed. The report separates that there is a large amount of crime that is related to addictions, mental health and poverty. Treat the problem and your reduce the probability of further crime.

They also identify that work done to prepare the lower risk offender for reintegration into the community will positively impact the recidivism rate. Inmates who are poorly prepared for release struggle with integration and are then at higher risk to reoffend.  Creating a link to a rehabilitative approach seems to be socially desirable but also appears to have strong positive impacts on the costs of managing the criminal justice system. In times of high economic stress in countries, finding ways to reduce prison populations will reduce government expenditures. What this research tells us is that can be done without increasing risk to communities.

The report is available on the web through the PEW website.