'It has gotten a lot better, but it is still bad': Experiences with the police among marginalized PWUDs in a context of depenalization.

Based on a survey (n = 249) and qualitative interviews (n = 38) with marginalized people who use drugs (PWUDs) in Copenhagen, Denmark, we investigate the experiences of this group with the police in a context where drug possession had been depenalized in and around drug consumption rooms (DCRs). Our findings point to positive experiences with the police, especially with the local community police in the depenalization zone, who refrained from drug law enforcement and practiced 'harm reduction policing.' However, marginalized PWUDs also reported that they were still targeted for drug possession by other sections of the police despite the depenalization policy. Specifically, the drug squad of the police would continue to confiscate illicit drugs for investigatory purposes to counter organized drug crime, as well as continue to target user-dealers who were not formally included in the depenalization policy. The findings illustrate how marginalized PWUDs still found themselves in a precarious legal situation without any legal rights to possess the drugs that they were dependent on, even though possession of drugs had been depenalized in and around DCRs.

From punishment to help? Continuity and change in the Norwegian decriminalization reform proposal.

BACKGROUND: In 2018 the Norwegian government appointed a committee to prepare the implementation of a drug decriminalization reform. The overall goal of the committee was to propose a model where responsibility for society's response to the use and possession of illegal drugs for personal use would be transferred from the justice sector to the health service, under the catchphrase 'from punishment to help'. While the proposal ultimately did not get the necessary backing in parliament, the proposed reform still constitutes a very comprehensive and recent proposal for reforming national drug policy and it provides an ideal case for studying contemporary discourses on 'drug decriminalization'. METHODS: The analysis of this reform proposal is guided by the post-structuralist "What's the Problem Represented to be" (WPR) approach, which is used for investigating the problem representation(s) in the proposal, as well as the rationalities, practices and deep-seated assumptions underpinning these. In doing this, the paper explores how the strategy represents both changes and continuities in discourses around illicit drugs and the people who use them. RESULTS: Based on the WPR approach, two problem representations in the proposal are identified: the 'problem of illicit drug use' and the 'problem of criminalization'. However, the 'problem of illicit drug use' is argued to be the authoritative representation, that takes precedence over the other. In that regard, the paper points to how the proposed shift from the justice sector to the health sector would only be partial, given that the role of the police and drug law enforcement would be retained in the reform. Furthermore, the paper points to how illicit drug use continued to be fundamentally pathologized in the proposed reform. CONCLUSION: The paper concludes with a discussion about the overall ambition of shifting from a crime-centered to a health-centered approach to people who use drugs and some reflections on the potential of an additional rights-based approach is provided.

Being 'in place', being 'out of place': Problematising marginalised drug users in two cities.

BACKGROUND: Socially marginalised drug users when congregating in the public space on so-called 'open drug scenes' are often problematised, especially in post-industrial cities which increasingly are engaged in attempts to attract those that are considered to be promoters of economic activity through processes of 'beautification' and 'gentrification'. The different punitive practices that target homeless and marginalised drug users in the public space have been rendered visible in a range of influential accounts since the 1990s. However, these accounts have mostly been based on the US context and it has been argued that, in a European context, responses from local governments have been more variegated and ambivalent. METHODS: Two case studies of the response to homeless and marginalised drug users in public space were investigated in the two major cities of Denmark, Aarhus and Copenhagen. In order to account for the differences in responses to marginalised drug users between the two cases, the different problematisations of their presence were investigated through document analysis and interviews with key stakeholders. RESULTS: The marginalised drug users were seen as 'out of place' in the open drug scene in Aarhus, while the marginalised drug users in the open drug scene in Copenhagen repeatedly were discursively constructed as being 'in place' and having a historical 'right' to be in this particular neighbourhood. CONCLUSION: The study illustrates that, by using the concept of 'problematisation', it is possible to reveal the assumptions about the proper use of the public space that underlies responses to the presence of marginalised drug users. Comparisons of such problematisations render us able to see how similar issues of marginalised drug users and the use of the public space can be problematised differently in different urban spaces and how this can legitimise specific governmental responses.