Disaster, War, and Drugs: Policy Levers and Rebuilding Communities

Abstract

Purpose – In this chapter, we expand the definition of disaster through combining the tenets of disaster studies with the literature on risks and consequences of war and conflict-related displacement and dislocation, with a focus on the challenges that drug misuse and changing drug markets present in these contexts. We conclude with policy recommendations for successful community rebuilding with relation to drugs and drug markets following various forms of disaster, gleaned from the combination of these areas of inquiry.

Design/methodology/approach – We discuss the concepts of risk, social vulnerability, and consequences as related to traditional conceptualizations of disaster, and highlight how they can also be applied to the study of veterans returning from war. We focus the on the similarities related to drugs and drug markets.

Findings – Overall, the similar vulnerabilities, potential for trauma, and drug-related consequences experienced by both disaster survivors and veterans suggest that the experience of war and return from such an event could be considered a disaster and analyzed as such.

Originality/value of power – Few scholars have examined how to expand the definition of a disaster and what is examined in the field of disaster studies. This chapter does this by examining how war could be analyzed as a disaster. It demonstrates the parallels between war and traditional disaster.

Citation

Reid, M., Bennett, A., Elliot, L. and Golub, A. (2012), "  Disaster, War, and Drugs: Policy Levers and Rebuilding Communities", Deflem, M. (Ed.) Disasters, Hazards and Law (Sociology of Crime, Law and Deviance, Vol. 17), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 43-62. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1521-6136(2012)0000017006