Drugs and Diplomacy

[Dragonfan]

Antwerp, March 2009

A RESEARCH INTO THE PARTICIPATION OF DRUG USER ORGANISATIONS IN THE DESIGN OF DRUG POLICIES ON A LOCAL AND EUROPEAN LEVEL

 

Please find herewith the final report of a research on the participation of associations representing drug users in the design and implementation of policies that directly affect their lives: drug policies. Concretely the research has looked into the way this participation takes place on a local level (in the Drug Plans of the Autonomous Community of Euskadi – Basque Country, Spain) and on a European level (the European Union Drug Action Plans).

The research was carried out between October 2008 and January 2009, by the European Coalition for Just and Effective Drug Policies (ENCOD), in collaboration with various of its members in the Basque Country (Ganjazz, Ekimen 2000 and Iker Giraldo Cuadrado), and in the rest of Spain: FAC and FAUDAS.

We wish to express our gratitude to all drug users, representatives of drug user organizations, health workers and experts who gave their time and energy to this research. Especially to those who made this project possible . . . We also wish to express our gratitude to the Basque Government, Direction Drug Dependencies, for giving us this opportunity.

We hope this report will be useful to improve the dialogue between authorities and drug users, and that this dialogue will lead to more effective and just drug policies.

We hope you will enjoy reading this report.