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Europe: Drugs -- Sweden's Strict Policies
(Part 4)
By Jeremy Bransten
In this fourth of a five-part series on drug use and drug policies in
Europe, RFE/RL correspondent Jeremy Bransten examines the case of Sweden.
He finds that, in strong contrast to the Netherlands -- which has
decriminalized cannabis-based drugs -- Sweden has sought for almost a
quarter-of-a-century to create a "drug-free society" through interdiction
and police control.
Prague, 30 November 2000 (RFE/RL) -- On drug policies, Sweden represents
the opposite end of the spectrum from the Netherlands. Since 1977, the
Swedish government's focus has been to prevent people from coming into
contact with illicit drugs through police enforcement and interdiction.
This strategy is closer to the model of the U.S. federal government, which
allocates most of its resources to what is termed "the war on drugs." In
Sweden, unlike most other members of the European Union, the possession and
use of any amount of illicit drugs are subject to prosecution.
For much of the 1980s, Sweden's strict policies appeared to work. Drug use,
especially marijuana smoking, decreased as police enforcement efforts
increased.
But in the 1990s, the statistics reversed course. Drug use, especially
among young people, rose sharply to levels close to those of the 1970s,
before the strict measures were introduced.
Leif Lenke teaches criminology at Stockholm University and has advised the
Council of Europe on drug policy. He explains:
"In the 1990s, you can see that this very good [previous] situation in this
[drug] area deteriorated. And I think the situation is back to about what
was going on in the 1970s, before the very restrictive Swedish policy was
introduced and enforced. So now you see in the 1990s there has been a
rather strong increase in young people experimenting with drugs."
Lenke says experimental marijuana use among teenagers and young adults, who
are screened when they enter military service, is now comparable to figures
in European countries where prohibition is not enforced.
"We have studies with conscripts. Every year, the conscripts are
interviewed about their drug habits and so on, and we can see that there
has been an increase from 7 percent use in the 1980s to 16 to 17 percent now."
As drug use has gone up, politicians have continued to rely on the police,
gradually increasing their powers to enforce the country's anti-drug
policy. Since 1993, police have been empowered to stop anyone they suspect
was using drugs and force the suspect to provide a blood or urine sample.
But a new report by the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention -- a
government-funded institute -- questions the effectiveness of these
tactics. According to the council, in the period from 1991 to 1997 -- when
arrests for minor drug offenses increased by 70 percent -- there was with
no decline in drug use statistics.
The problem is not confined to so-called "soft drugs'" like marijuana. The
European Monitoring Center for Drugs and Addiction writes in its annual
2000 report that drug overdose death rates in Sweden are among the highest
in the EU and more than seven times higher than in the Netherlands. The
report also states that the rate of hepatitis C among intravenous drug
users in Sweden is over 90 percent, the highest in Europe.
Tim Boekhout van Solinge, a criminologist and drug-policy expert at the
University of Amsterdam, has recently written a book comparing the Swedish
and Dutch experience with drugs. During his research, he made repeated
visits to the working-class suburbs of Stockholm, Malmoe, and Gothenberg --
Sweden's three major cities. Van Solinge told RFE/RL he was shocked by what
he saw. He paints a picture of unemployed, mostly immigrant youths, whiling
away their time experimenting with all manner of drugs, often intravenously.
So what went wrong in Sweden? In Stockholm, Leif Lenke says economics has
played a big part.
"The Swedish economy at the beginning of the [19]90s deteriorated very
strongly and created a high rate of youth unemployment. And that has been
so until the last two years. I think that now unemployment is down again.
So that is a factor that should be taken into consideration when you try to
evaluate the situation in Sweden."
Van Solinge says the economic downturn also led to cutbacks in
state-funded, drug-treatment facilities. At a national level, politicians
reassigned funds to the police.
"It [drug treatment] costs a lot of money, and in the 1980s the Swedes had
all this money. In the 1990s, the welfare state kind of collapsed. There
was not so much money. What you could see is that at a local level, where
they have to decide about treatment or not, the results were low, it was
very expensive, so they didn't put people in treatment anymore, because it
was considered too expensive. So, then, the policy became repressive."
Van Solinge also faults the Swedish approach to drug education in schools.
He says the overall message conveyed in classrooms -- that all drugs are
extremely dangerous and therefore should not be touched -- is ineffectual.
Teenagers don't believe it, he says, and in addition they end up
ill-informed about drugs that could pose a real danger.
"In Sweden, sometimes if you read prevention material, you think cannabis
is really the most dangerous drug that exists. Maybe this worked for some
time because everyone believed it, but now we're in a completely different
situation. People don't know what to believe anymore and you see kids
experimenting with heroin and they don't really know what it is."
Van Solinge says supporters of Sweden's tough drug policy have
underestimated social factors, focusing too much on the actual substance
instead of concentrating on the reasons people use drugs. He says the fact
that drug use is widespread in prisons, even Swedish ones, indicates
enforcement cannot work by itself. Admitting as much, he says, would put
politicians in a difficult spot. Van Solinge says:
"But of course, politicians don't like to talk about this, they always talk
about the drug and not so much what kind of people [use them]. They never
like talking about that. It's easier to blame the drug than the difficult
social conditions these people are living in, which makes them just more
vulnerable to substance use and abuse."
Ted Goldberg, who also teaches at Stockholm University and has written a
book entitled "Demystifying Drugs," says flatly that Swedish policy has
failed and Swedish policy-makers have begun to confront that reality.
Change at the grassroots is already occurring, he says, although slowly.
"Things are changing in Sweden, slowly. We do have examples of 'harm
reduction' in Sweden even if we don't talk about them out loud. For
instance, we have methadone maintenance and just about a year ago, the
number of places for methadone maintenance was increased from 600 to 800.
We also have needle exchange programs."
But the issue of drugs remains highly sensitive in Sweden, with little
public debate on the subject. Advocates of total prohibition say that
decriminalizing certain "soft" drugs -- as has taken place in the
Netherlands and some other EU members -- could set a dangerous precedent.
Tomas Hallberg heads a Stockholm-based group (European Cities Against
Drugs) backing the Swedish government's zero-tolerance measures. He puts it
this way:
"If you criminalize something, you can decriminalize it, and you don't have
a problem. You can do that with any crime, if you want to, and say there is
no problem whatsoever afterwards."
In January 2001, Sweden assumes the rotating presidency of the EU.
Officials in Stockholm had originally announced they would make their
strategy for a drug-free society a central plank of their EU program. That
idea has been shelved as Sweden -- still admired abroad for its many
progressive policies -- finds itself out of step on this one with most of
its EU partners.
By Jeremy Bransten
In this fourth of a five-part series on drug use and drug policies in
Europe, RFE/RL correspondent Jeremy Bransten examines the case of Sweden.
He finds that, in strong contrast to the Netherlands -- which has
decriminalized cannabis-based drugs -- Sweden has sought for almost a
quarter-of-a-century to create a "drug-free society" through interdiction
and police control.
Prague, 30 November 2000 (RFE/RL) -- On drug policies, Sweden represents
the opposite end of the spectrum from the Netherlands. Since 1977, the
Swedish government's focus has been to prevent people from coming into
contact with illicit drugs through police enforcement and interdiction.
This strategy is closer to the model of the U.S. federal government, which
allocates most of its resources to what is termed "the war on drugs." In
Sweden, unlike most other members of the European Union, the possession and
use of any amount of illicit drugs are subject to prosecution.
For much of the 1980s, Sweden's strict policies appeared to work. Drug use,
especially marijuana smoking, decreased as police enforcement efforts
increased.
But in the 1990s, the statistics reversed course. Drug use, especially
among young people, rose sharply to levels close to those of the 1970s,
before the strict measures were introduced.
Leif Lenke teaches criminology at Stockholm University and has advised the
Council of Europe on drug policy. He explains:
"In the 1990s, you can see that this very good [previous] situation in this
[drug] area deteriorated. And I think the situation is back to about what
was going on in the 1970s, before the very restrictive Swedish policy was
introduced and enforced. So now you see in the 1990s there has been a
rather strong increase in young people experimenting with drugs."
Lenke says experimental marijuana use among teenagers and young adults, who
are screened when they enter military service, is now comparable to figures
in European countries where prohibition is not enforced.
"We have studies with conscripts. Every year, the conscripts are
interviewed about their drug habits and so on, and we can see that there
has been an increase from 7 percent use in the 1980s to 16 to 17 percent now."
As drug use has gone up, politicians have continued to rely on the police,
gradually increasing their powers to enforce the country's anti-drug
policy. Since 1993, police have been empowered to stop anyone they suspect
was using drugs and force the suspect to provide a blood or urine sample.
But a new report by the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention -- a
government-funded institute -- questions the effectiveness of these
tactics. According to the council, in the period from 1991 to 1997 -- when
arrests for minor drug offenses increased by 70 percent -- there was with
no decline in drug use statistics.
The problem is not confined to so-called "soft drugs'" like marijuana. The
European Monitoring Center for Drugs and Addiction writes in its annual
2000 report that drug overdose death rates in Sweden are among the highest
in the EU and more than seven times higher than in the Netherlands. The
report also states that the rate of hepatitis C among intravenous drug
users in Sweden is over 90 percent, the highest in Europe.
Tim Boekhout van Solinge, a criminologist and drug-policy expert at the
University of Amsterdam, has recently written a book comparing the Swedish
and Dutch experience with drugs. During his research, he made repeated
visits to the working-class suburbs of Stockholm, Malmoe, and Gothenberg --
Sweden's three major cities. Van Solinge told RFE/RL he was shocked by what
he saw. He paints a picture of unemployed, mostly immigrant youths, whiling
away their time experimenting with all manner of drugs, often intravenously.
So what went wrong in Sweden? In Stockholm, Leif Lenke says economics has
played a big part.
"The Swedish economy at the beginning of the [19]90s deteriorated very
strongly and created a high rate of youth unemployment. And that has been
so until the last two years. I think that now unemployment is down again.
So that is a factor that should be taken into consideration when you try to
evaluate the situation in Sweden."
Van Solinge says the economic downturn also led to cutbacks in
state-funded, drug-treatment facilities. At a national level, politicians
reassigned funds to the police.
"It [drug treatment] costs a lot of money, and in the 1980s the Swedes had
all this money. In the 1990s, the welfare state kind of collapsed. There
was not so much money. What you could see is that at a local level, where
they have to decide about treatment or not, the results were low, it was
very expensive, so they didn't put people in treatment anymore, because it
was considered too expensive. So, then, the policy became repressive."
Van Solinge also faults the Swedish approach to drug education in schools.
He says the overall message conveyed in classrooms -- that all drugs are
extremely dangerous and therefore should not be touched -- is ineffectual.
Teenagers don't believe it, he says, and in addition they end up
ill-informed about drugs that could pose a real danger.
"In Sweden, sometimes if you read prevention material, you think cannabis
is really the most dangerous drug that exists. Maybe this worked for some
time because everyone believed it, but now we're in a completely different
situation. People don't know what to believe anymore and you see kids
experimenting with heroin and they don't really know what it is."
Van Solinge says supporters of Sweden's tough drug policy have
underestimated social factors, focusing too much on the actual substance
instead of concentrating on the reasons people use drugs. He says the fact
that drug use is widespread in prisons, even Swedish ones, indicates
enforcement cannot work by itself. Admitting as much, he says, would put
politicians in a difficult spot. Van Solinge says:
"But of course, politicians don't like to talk about this, they always talk
about the drug and not so much what kind of people [use them]. They never
like talking about that. It's easier to blame the drug than the difficult
social conditions these people are living in, which makes them just more
vulnerable to substance use and abuse."
Ted Goldberg, who also teaches at Stockholm University and has written a
book entitled "Demystifying Drugs," says flatly that Swedish policy has
failed and Swedish policy-makers have begun to confront that reality.
Change at the grassroots is already occurring, he says, although slowly.
"Things are changing in Sweden, slowly. We do have examples of 'harm
reduction' in Sweden even if we don't talk about them out loud. For
instance, we have methadone maintenance and just about a year ago, the
number of places for methadone maintenance was increased from 600 to 800.
We also have needle exchange programs."
But the issue of drugs remains highly sensitive in Sweden, with little
public debate on the subject. Advocates of total prohibition say that
decriminalizing certain "soft" drugs -- as has taken place in the
Netherlands and some other EU members -- could set a dangerous precedent.
Tomas Hallberg heads a Stockholm-based group (European Cities Against
Drugs) backing the Swedish government's zero-tolerance measures. He puts it
this way:
"If you criminalize something, you can decriminalize it, and you don't have
a problem. You can do that with any crime, if you want to, and say there is
no problem whatsoever afterwards."
In January 2001, Sweden assumes the rotating presidency of the EU.
Officials in Stockholm had originally announced they would make their
strategy for a drug-free society a central plank of their EU program. That
idea has been shelved as Sweden -- still admired abroad for its many
progressive policies -- finds itself out of step on this one with most of
its EU partners.