Criminal Artefacts: Governing Drugs and Users

Attitudes toward crime, criminals, and rehabilitation have shiftedconsiderably, yet the idea that there is a causal link between drugaddiction and crime prevails. As law reformers call for addictiontreatment as a remedy to the failing war on drugs, it is also time toconsider the serious implications of joining legal and therapeuticpractices in an assumedly benevolent bid to cure the offender. Casestudies from drug treatment courts and addiction treatment programsillustrate the tensions between law and psychology, treatment andpunishment, and conflicting theories of addiction. By looking curiouslyon the criminal addict as an artefact of criminal justice, this bookasks us to question why the criminalized drug user has become such afocus of contemporary criminal justice practices.