The Legalization of Cannabis and the Question of Reparations

Kojo Koram

Journal of International Economic Law, 2022, vol. 25, issue 2, 294-311

Abstract: This article surveys the dramatic sea change in the legal status of both the domestic and international cannabis trade over the past decade and asks whether legalization challenges or complements racial capitalism. As the changing status of prohibited drugs not only seeks to correct a historical wrong but also gives rise to a new, highly profitable cross-border commodities market, I analyse whether the variety of policies that are currently being implemented alongside cannabis legalization—from import restrictions to social equity licences—is sufficient to appease the demand for reparations by the communities who suffered the most through the past century of the ‘War on Drugs’. This ‘War on Drugs’ was both historically and structurally weighted towards the reinforcement of racial hierarchies. As it enters into its twilight, I find that an overview of both the international and domestic laws that are being passed in order to introduce a new age of legal, commercial cannabis threatens to lock in the racial inequalities of our global economy, rather than serve as a tool for the advancement of reparative racial justice.

Date: 2022
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/jiel/jgac026 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:jieclw:v:25:y:2022:i:2:p:294-311.

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://academic.oup.com/journals

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of International Economic Law is currently edited by Kathleen Claussen, Sergio Puig and Michael Waibel

More articles in Journal of International Economic Law from Oxford University Press Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP, UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().