Drug Plants and the Transformation of Indigenous Landscapes

Dangerous Harvest: Drug Plants and the Transformation of Indigenous Landscapes Michael K. Steinberg Joseph J. Hobbs Kent Mathewson, Editors OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS DANGEROUS HARVEST This page intentionally left blank DANGEROUS HARVEST Drug Plants and the Transformation of Indigenous Landscapes Edited by Michael K. Steinberg Joseph J. Hobbs Kent Mathewson 1 2004 1 Oxford New York Auckland Bangkok Buenos Aires Cape Town Chennai Dar es Salaam Delhi Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kolkata Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Mumbai Nairobi São Paulo Shanghai Taipei Tokyo Toronto Copyright ©2004 by Oxford Unversity Press, Inc. Published by Oxford University Press, Inc. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York, 10016 www.oup.com Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford Univesity Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Dangerous harvest: drug plants and the transformation of indigenous landscapes / edited by Michael K. Steinberg, Joseph J. Hobbs, and Kent Mathewson. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-19-514319-1; ISBN 0-19-514320-5 (pbk) 1. Drug traffic. 2. Narcotics, Control of. 3. Drug abuse. I. Steinberg, Michael K., 1965– II. Hobbs, Joseph J. (Joseph John), 1956– III. Mathewson, Kent, 1946– HV5801 .D246 2003 363.45— dc21 2002014779 987654321 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper Contents Contributors vii Introduction 3 Michael K. Steinberg I Background Issues 1 Drugs, Moral Geographies, and Indigenous Peoples: Some Initial Mappings and Central Issues 11 Kent Mathewson 2 The Stimulus of Prohibition: A Critical History of the Global Narcotics Trade 24 Alfred W. McCoy II Case Studies 3 Opium and the People of Laos 115 Joseph Westermeyer 4 Opium Production in Afghanistan and Pakistan 133 Nigel J. R. Allan vi Contents 5 The State and the Ongoing Struggle Over Coca in Bolivia: Legitimacy, Hegemony, and the Exercise of Power 153 Harry Sanabria 6 The Marijuana Milpa: Agricultural Adaptations in a Postsubsistence Maya Landscape in Southern Belize 167 Michael K. Steinberg 7 Sacred and Profane Uses of the Cactus Lophophora Williamsii from the South Texas Peyote Gardens 182 Clarissa T. Kimber Darrel McDonald 8 Desert Traffic: The Dynamics of the Drug Trade in Northwestern Mexico 209 Eric P. Perramond III History and Drug Plants 9 Cannabis in Colonial India: Production, State Intervention, and Resistance in the Late Nineteenth-Century Bengali Landscape 221 James H. Mills 10 Suppressing Opium and “Reforming” Minorities: Antidrug Campaigns in Ethnic Communities in the Early People’s Republic of China 232 Zhou Yongming IV Environmental Issues 11 Environmental and Social Consequences of Coca/Cocaine in Peru: Policy Alternatives and a Research Agenda 249 Kenneth R. Young 12 Modern Use and Environmental Impact of the Kava Plant in Remote Oceania 274 Mark Merlin William Raynor 13 The Global Nexus of Drug Cultivation 294 Joseph J. Hobbs Index 313 Contributors Nigel J. R. Allan Mark Merlin Department of Environmental Design Biology Program University of California, Davis University of Hawaii at Manoa Joseph J. Hobbs James Mills Department of Geography Department of History University of Missouri–Columbia University of Strathclyde, UK Clarissa Kimber Eric P. Perramond Department of Geography Department of Geography and Texas A&M University Environmental Studies Stetson University Kent Mathewson Department of Geography and William Raynor Anthropology Field Director Louisiana State University The Nature Conservancy, Pohnpei Island, FSM Alfred W. McCoy Department of History Harry Sanabria University of Wisconsin–Madison Department of Anthropology University of Pittsburgh Darrel McDonald Department of Political Science and Michael K. Steinberg Geography Cultural Biogeographer Stephen F. Austin State University U.S. Department of Agriculture PLANTS Database Baton Rouge, Louisiana viii Contributors Joseph Westermeyer Kenneth R. Young Medical School Department of Geography University of Minnesota University of Texas at Austin Zhou Yongming Department of Anthropology University of Wisconsin–Madison DANGEROUS HARVEST This page intentionally left blank Introduction Michael K. Steinberg he global drug trade and its associated violence, corruption, and human Tsuffering create global problems that involve not only the use and abuse of substances that have traveled across great geographic spaces but also political and military conflict and policy, economic development, and indigenous and ethnic minority rights in the production regions. Drug production and eradication efforts di- rectly affect the stability of many states and relations between states, shaping and sometimes distorting foreign policy (McCoy 1991, 1999; Bagley and Walker 1996; Meyer and Parssinen 1998; Albright 1999; Rohter 1999). Drug production and the efforts to halt it often derail national and local development (Westermeyer 1982; Smith 1992; Goodson 2001) and create potential human rights violations as small-scale pro- ducers get caught in the legal crossfire between their dangerous harvest and economic hardship (Sanabria 1992; Kent 1993; Clawson and Lee 1998). External demand and influence, not indigenous cultures, have transformed apparently simple, local agricultural activities into very complex global problems. Psychoactive plants have always played important cultural roles in indigenous and ethnic minority landscapes. After a history of coevolution and experimentation, indigenous societies came to use psychoactive substances derived from plants in a range of religious and healing rituals. Traditional healers, or shamans, consume psychoactive plants to consult with the spiritual world in order to foretell the future and assist patients; patients ingest psychoactive substances to rid themselves of demons or diseases; and indigenous cultures use psychoactive substances in semi- ritualistic social situations to reinforce social and political bonds or simply as recre- ation. However, as these traditional cultures come into contact with the outside world, nonindigenous societies often mimic these practices, trying to reach a “new level of consciousness.” 3 4 Introduction The poppy is an example of a psychoactive plant taken out of a traditional con- text and adopted by cultural outsiders for nonsacred use. In turn, globalization al- ters the plant’s use and symbolic meaning within its traditional-use hearth area. Several chapters in this volume show that heroin, a derivative of poppies, is used and abused worldwide and in its original hearth, where the plant was once viewed as a sacred medicinal and ritualistic plant. The profane use of opium leaves a trail of destruction in its wake in the form of addicts and soaring HIV rates as the virus spreads through shared heroin needles. As Westerners bastardize the acts and rituals associated with the plants, the people and traditions in the hearth areas, where these plants were once regarded as noble, are destroyed. Eradication authorities often target indigenous farmers, along with drug traffickers, dealers, and kingpins, destroying the farmers’ cultures and environments. This militarization of psychoactive substance landscapes places indigenous cultures on the front line of the war on drugs, creating a dangerous harvest for cultures in drug plant production areas. For example, indigenous peasant farmers who produce coca in the Andean region of South America often must choose between ex- treme poverty and the lure of a cash crop with a steady market. However, the costs of participating in the production of coca are aerial spraying that destroys food crops, imprisonment, and violent threats from various factions that either support or attempt to suppress this economy. Present situations in Afghanistan, Burma, Colombia, and Peru provide examples of the link between psychoactive plant production centers and socially unstable, often militarized indigenous landscapes. Today, both rogue governments and rebel forces depend on the income generated by the profane use of traditional psychoactive plant substances to support their policies (Kent 1993; Cohen 1998; Steinberg 2000). As a result of the connection among rebel groups, rogue governments, and the drug trade, drug eradication planning and policy by the United States, in particu- lar, is an increasingly important aspect of international relations and military policy. The war on drugs is no longer viewed as a public health issue or one of personal choice. Drug eradication is now squarely in the corner of military planning and policy. The most overt example of this new eradication perspective is Plan Colombia, under which U.S. military aid inadvertently funds Colombia’s war with various left- ist groups who also produce drugs. Before their expulsion from Afghanistan, the Taliban regime had also benefited from a drug “tax” imposed on poppy farmers (Goodson 2001). Given the recent attacks in New York City, and the financial links between opium and the Taliban, it is likely that opium production in Central Asia will receive greater attention from U.S. military authorities. Thus the line between war and the war on drugs is becoming more and more unclear. Yet what do we (the West and especially eradication authorities) really know about those who produce the drugs that help fuel

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