Drugs, Death and Demand

I read in the news yesterday that Indonesia executed 8 men for drug trafficking. From watching movies over the years, I have also come to know that drug possession and trafficking is a serious crime that is punishable by death in countries like Indonesia, Malaysia (and maybe even Singapore, though I am not sure).

I have always been strongly against anyone who traffics or sells drugs – because the only reason I see why these people do what they do is greed and money-motive. It is just not excusable to traffic or sell drugs knowing that what they do is affecting young people and families in extremely horrible ways. It tends to destroy a society and its culture. So it is just not excusable.

All this said, I should also note that I am generally against death penalty. I just don’t believe that the state has the right to kill people. It seems barbaric and societies need to have an honest debate if these criminals should be executed even if they seem to exhibit a genuine willingness to change for the better and rehabilitate over the course of many years. Yes, some criminals don’t change and we all have to have a debate on what to do with these repeat offenders and how to punish them or put them away from society. But there could also be criminals who could be rehabilitated. Two of the eight persons executed in Indonesia are Australians and this is what the Australian prime minister had to say – These executions are “unnecessary because both of these young Australians were fully rehabilitated while in prison.” Now, we will not know for sure if they were fully rehabilitated or not. But what if they were? – especially considering that they were arrested ten years ago when they were aged 21 and 23.

Now the other reason why the criminal justice system in many countries still has the death penalty is to stop future offenders from committing the same crime – basically, these countries argue that the death penalty acts a deterrent. It may or may not be true depending on the crime. But what needs to be studied is – is the death penalty the only deterrent?

Now coming to the drug problem, I think countries are fighting it in the wrong way. As like in any product, as long as there is demand, there will be supply. We kill one supplier, then the next supplier pops up. The more we kill, the price of the product increases, as the demand remains the same and supply dwindles. It is just a matter of time before another supplier (this time well organized) fills in the gap as the risk/reward ratio would have gone up. So we will kill more and the cycle would just continue thereby creating mafias and drug gangs along the way. So I believe to address the drug problem, the demand side needs to be addressed – meaning, demand should be brought down (almost to nil would be ideal) along with the supply. How to bring down the demand is a matter to discuss and debate by the societies concerned - but I would recommend a little civilized way rather than a barbaric death sentence.

Reference:

1. http://news.yahoo.com/australia-cant-more-death-row-prisoners-indonesia-055550357.html