Abstract for ISSDP Conference 2011
Title:
The context and impact of local drug economies: implications for policy.
Author:
Dr Aileen O’Gorman
Job Title:
Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Address:
School of Applied Social Sciences, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4,
Ireland.
Tel:
00 353 1 716 88194
Email:
aileen.ogorman@ucd.ie
Abstract
The context and impact of a local drug economies: implications for policy.
This paper draws on data collected during a major research study of ‘Progress and Problems
in Social Housing Estates’ which was carried out in Ireland between 2007 and 2009. The
project was a follow-up to a study of seven local authority (social) housing estates which
had been carried out ten years earlier between 1997 and 1999. Both studies examined social
conditions in the seven estates in order to draw implications for policy. A key differentiation
between the estates in terms of their being perceived as ‘troubled’ or ‘settled’ was the
impact of drug use, drug markets and drug-related violence on the quality of life of
residents. This tended to result in pharmocentric policy responses whereby the drugs and
their pharmacological effects were positioned as the key causal factors for the poor quality
of life on the estates and policies were developed accordingly. In contrast, the broader
political economy analysis undertaken by this study identified community drug scenes to be
clearly linked to problems in a range of social policy and governance arenas such as housing
management, policing, the built environment, employment and education opportunities, and
social care and protection services.
Supported by interview and ethnographic data with drug users and other residents; housing
management, police and law enforcement officials; and workers in drug and community
services; as well as relevant drug trend and economic data; this paper examines the impact
of drug use and drug markets on life in the estates. Using a political economy framework of
analysis, this paper examines local drug trends; the opportunities provided by the drugs
economy to young people excluded from the formal market economy; and the drug related
violence and crime arising from the rapid expansion of the drugs economy during the Irish
economic boom. By placing the local situation in a broader context this paper suggests a revisioning of drug policies to incorporate a social protection pillar.