Agency and Exchange: an Ethnography of a Heroin Marketplace

View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by espace@Curtin Faculty of Health Sciences National Drug Research Institute Agency and exchange: an ethnography of a heroin marketplace Robyn Dwyer This thesis is presented for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy of Curtin University of Technology May 2009 Declaration To the best of my knowledge and belief this thesis contains no material previously published by any other person except where due acknowledgement has been made. This thesis contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma in any university. Signature: …………………………………………. Date: ………………………... Abstract This thesis is concerned with the exchange of heroin in localised, street-based marketplaces. Commercial exchange of heroin in such sites has been a characteristic of the Australian heroin scene since the early 1990s. Although some qualitative investigations have been undertaken, the dominant approach to understanding these sites in Australia has been quantitative (primarily epidemiological and criminological). These efforts largely adopt a narrow and under-developed conception of ‘markets’ and much of this work adopts a narrow and circumscribed conception of the subjects who act within these sites. In contrast, this thesis is positioned within a long tradition of ethnographic accounts of drug users as active agents and of drug markets as embedded in particular social, cultural and economic contexts. In this thesis, I explore two related questions: 1) what are the social relations and processes constituting street-based drug markets, and 2) how do participants in these street-based drug markets express agency, given that, in public and research discourses, they are often understood and depicted either as lacking agency or as expressing agency only through profit-seeking, criminality or both. I explore these questions through an ethnographic examination of the everyday lives of Vietnamese heroin user/dealers who participate in a local heroin marketplace in the Melbourne suburb of Footscray. The key analytical concerns are the social relations through which this particular market is constituted, the social and cultural processes of exchange through which the market is produced and reproduced, and the ways in which participants in the market express agency, including the ways in which their agency might be constrained. My ethnography of the Footscray drug marketplace reveals that the marketplace is constituted by complex and dynamic social processes and relations. With a focus on drug user/dealers, my analysis condenses to two major themes – those of agency and exchange. Throughout the thesis, I show how, and in what ways, drug marketplace participants act on the world, achieve diverse outcomes (intended or otherwise, constrained or not) and, thus, express their agency. I also demonstrate the complexities of heroin exchange in the marketplace, revealing that heroin is i exchanged in multiple ways (e.g. through trade, barter and gifts) for multiple purposes and according to multiple and fluid classifications of social relationships. My account shows the embeddedness of the Footscray drug marketplace – that it is shaped by its particular historical, social, cultural, political and economic context. I show also how market processes – such as exchange – are shaped by culturally patterned ideas about what is right, wrong and even conceivable. This thesis also problematises dominant constructions of drug user subjectivity. Such conceptions have ethical and political implications with regard to the ways in which drug users are understood, judged, regulated and governed. My analysis suggests that the subjectivity of Footscray dealers is ambiguous, contradictory and multiple, constituted not simply by instrumental rationality but by a complex of motivations and by the cultural and social formations which shape these motivations. This thesis provides an alternative to the dominant approaches to understanding Australian drug markets and marketplaces. Accounts of drug markets tend to privilege an etic view that is theoretically underpinned by neo-classical economic models of markets. Additionally, the quantitative methodological approaches that predominate in Australian drug market research tend to preclude considerations of process and temporality. In contrast, in this thesis I privilege an emic account of the drug marketplace. Influenced by theoretical frameworks drawn from anthropology, in my examination of the everyday lives of drug user/dealers, I stress the importance of the social, political and cultural dimensions of these people’s lives and direct attention to the importance and creativity of personal agency. Drug users and dealers are widely stigmatised and demonised as ‘other’, juxtaposed against supposedly ‘normal’ non-drug users. Dominant representations of drug users are unidimensional and do not capture the complexity of drug user agency and subjectivity. This thesis demonstrates that the people who sell heroin in the Footscray marketplace actively engage in a range of exchanges, for a range of purposes – subsistence, the creation of identity, the pursuit of prestige, reciprocity, sociality, the production and reproduction of social relations, and profit-making. My account, therefore, repositions drug users, challenging their stigmatisation by revealing that, in their everyday lives, they struggle with many of the same challenges that confront us all. ii Acknowledgements I am indebted to the many people and organisations who have, in various ways, contributed to the production of this thesis. The research was supported, in the first instance, by an Australian Postgraduate Award through Deakin University and then, by a National Drug Research Institute Postgraduate Scholarship when I transferred my enrolment to the National Drug Research Institute, Curtin University of Technology. These scholarships were essential during the intensive fieldwork and writing periods, as was the administrative support provided by the National Drug Research Institute. Two other organisations have provided employment support throughout the years – Turning Point Alcohol and Drug Centre Inc. and the Macfarlane Burnet Institute for Medical Research and Public Health – for which I am grateful. From these organisations, I particularly thank Alison Ritter, Margaret Hellard and Campbell Aitken for their ongoing interest and encouragement. Throughout this project, Paul Dietze has been an employer, a colleague, a friend and, briefly, an associate supervisor. For all this, and also for the carrots, I thank him. Peter Higgs, a colleague, friend and fellow student, introduced me to the network of dealers and shared his extensive knowledge. His enthusiasm, warmth and insights, particularly during the early days of fieldwork, were invaluable. I am also grateful to Hoàng Nguyễn, who welcomed me to Footscray, extended his trust and graciously introduced me to the Vietnamese dealers. His generosity and friendship is deeply appreciated. I thank Duyên Dương, Bec Winter, Stuart Armstrong and Oanh Nguyễn, colleagues with whom I shared the experience of conducting research in Footscray. They provided valuable insights and much needed friendship, personal support and laughter. At various times, I have also shared the highs and lows of PhD candidacy with fellow students, Beck Jenkinson, Amy Pennay, Rachael Green, Christine iii Siokou, Monica Barratt and postgrads from the Anthropology Department at the University of Melbourne. I would also like to thank Suzanne Fraser for her thoughtful comments, friendship and support and, particularly, for the words that helped me persevere with writing. I acknowledge the Footscray health and welfare workers for their dedication, compassion and practical assistance to the local drug marketplace participants, in particular, Richard Tregear and the team at Open Family and staff at HealthWorks. On a personal level, I thank family and friends – Diana, Chris, Bruce, Kath, Alex, Emily, Tim and Liz, Kate and Jem, Jane, Bern, Paul, David, Jode and Klara – who have all contributed, in some way, to this thesis, tolerating my overly long absence and neglect and providing unwavering support and encouragement. My penultimate thanks are to the three people who have most intimately shared in the production of this work and inspired and taught me to think anthropologically. My supervisor, David Moore, who has guided me through these long years, has been both mentor and friend. His work inspired my interest in applying anthropological frameworks to the study of people who use illicit drugs and, throughout the project, his intelligence, knowledge and experience have been invaluable. I thank him for his availability when needed and his endless patience as I struggled to think about my data and express my ideas. His steadfast support, encouragement and confidence in me is greatly appreciated. I could not have asked for a better supervisor. I also extend my thanks to my unofficial supervisors, Peter Dwyer and Monica Minnegal. I thank them for their willing engagement with a project not their own, their consistent availability, challenging questions, thoughtful and warm criticisms, guidance and encouragement, for the dinners and wine, and for their expectations that I was capable, and would, eventually, finish this thesis. Without their extraordinarily generous support, in every way (intellectual, emotional, financial), this thesis would not have happened. I cannot thank

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