A legal analysis of the War on Drugs

The so-called War on Drugs is the initiative started in the 1970s by the United States (US) to address drug-related crime and health problems using a supply-side approach. At the onset of its War on Drugs, the US treated the fight against drugs as a police problem, providing equipment and supplies to the police in drug-producing countries for counter-narcotic efforts. Since the 1980s, however, US drug policy has evolved: state security forces and private “guns for hire" alike have increased their use of military-grade weapons and tactics. Nevertheless, simply calling this initiative a “war" and giving military forces a significant role in its execution does not necessarily mean that the law of war-international humanitarian law (IHL)-applies. In fact, the privatization and militarization of the War on Drugs are blurring the line between police and military activities, rendering it difficult to discern the appropriate body of law to apply. While IHL pertains specifically to situations of armed conflict, international human rights law (IHRL) provides the set of obligations and rights that apply universally. The importance of distinguishing which of these bodies applies is due to differences in the types of protections they offer, the duty holders, and the applicable obligations: without knowing the rules of the game, it is difficult, if not impossible, to achieve accountability for rule-breaking behavior.This research project aims to analyze the challenges that recent evolutions in the War on Drugs pose to the application of IHL and IHRL. It argues that neither of these bodies of law alone is adequately equipped to cover “mixed" situations as War on Drugs and aims to participate in the debate on the convergence between IHL and IHRL by exploring the following question: can the convergence of IHL and IHRL improved accountability in mixed context such as the War on Drugs?Previous research completed during my PhD provides a useful basis for this project. My doctoral dissertation analyzed the use of private military and security companies in Latin America, and two of the case studies-Colombia and Mexico-are places where the War on Drugs takes place. The project is also inspired by a paper I authored on the application of IHL to the War on Drugs which won the 2013 International Humanitarian Law Student Writing Competition organized by the Center for Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at American University Washington College of Law, together with the American Society of International Law’s Lieber Society on the Law of Armed Conflict. As products of this research, I propose to prepare two legal articles for publication: one article on the challenges posed by the application of humanitarian law in the War on Drugs; the other on the convergence of IHL and IHRL, using the War on Drugs to illustrate the advantages of the convergence of these two bodies of law.