The Bolivian approach towards combating drug trafficking: a model to follow, or a sui generis case?

• In Event: Drug policies in Latin America: a survey of main approaches and obstacles to reduce drug production and drug trafficking

Abstract

In 2006, soon after its installation the administration of President Morales began to implement anti-narcotics policies that deviated from those that previous Bolivian administrations had applied for more than two decades. Especially, the new policy framework left aside the controversial forced coca-eradication strategy that the U.S. government had sponsored not only in Bolivia but also in the rest of Andean countries producers of coca. The Morales administration continued participating in anti-narcotics efforts, but on its own terms. The new policy framework puts emphasis in: the “rationalization” of coca cultivation, based on voluntary eradication and social control; coca leaf production and industrialization for licit uses; and economic development in the rural areas producers of coca. The present paper explores first the political/social context within which the new drug policy framework was built, the content of the new policies, and their results. Then, it compares the Bolivian and Peruvian strategies in combating drug trafficking. The paper attempts to answer if it is possible to imitate the Bolivian approach in other Andean countries producers of coca and what would be the obstacles in this regard.

Author

• Alba Hesselroth