The dilemmas of drug policy: Global to local

Raw Opium is a wide-ranging feature documentary about a commodity that has tremendous power – both to ease pain and to destroy lives. Building upon many of the issues raised within it, the accompanying panel discussion aims to explore the complexities of the illicit market in heroin and other controlled drugs as an area of public policy concern.

Reflecting the truly inter-disciplinary nature and expansive transnational scope of this topic, discussion will give attention to the challenges to policies and programmes within production, transit and consumer markets, including those in places as distant as Afghanistan and those closer to home.

Underpinned by the GDPO’s belief in the need for an evidence and rights based approach to policy formulation, the panel will question law enforcement dominated strategies and engage with debates about health-oriented approaches and shifts away from the so-called ‘war on drugs’.

The event will include:

• 4:30pm: Documentary screening: Raw Opium: Pain, Pleasure, Profits (2010); Director: Peter Findlay
• 6:00pm: Interval
• 6:30pm: Panel Discussion and audience Q+A – ‘The Dilemmas of Drug Policy: Global to Local’

Panel members

• Professor Julia Buxton (Chair) – GDPO Senior Research Officer and Professor of Comparative Politics, School of Public Policy at the Central European University, Budapest
• Baroness Molly Meacher, Chair, All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Drug Policy Reform
• Ifor Glyn – Chief Executive, SANDS CYMRU
• Mike Trace, Chief Executive, The Rehabilitation for Addicted Prisoners Trust (RAPt), Chair, International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC) steering group, former Deputy UK Anti-Drug Coordinator
• Professor David Bewley-Taylor – GDPO Director and Professor of International Relations and Public Policy, Swansea University

**Free admission; all individuals aged 16+ are very welcome to attend.

Venue: Taliesin Arts Centre, Swansea University.

RIAH contact: riah@swansea.ac.uk / 01792 295190

For further information on the Global Drug Policy Observatory click here.

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