International Policy on Illicit Drug Trafficking: The Formal and Informal Mechanisms

Abstract

In the last 10 years the world's leading economic powers have driven important changes in international policy on illicit drug trafficking. They have set up and financed semi-formal or informal transnational groups to proactively implement policy on the ground. This is a reaction to the bureaucratic, formal mechanisms of the United Nations and its agencies, where policy is diluted by the need for consensus among 53 member states, plus various regional groupings of other countries. The new groups take a more integrated approach to the problem by going beyond trafficking into countering money laundering and controlling the sale of precursor chemicals, which criminal gangs use to synthesize drugs earlier in the supply chain to reduce the bulk of trafficked materials. The established link between organized transnational crime, drugs, and the financing of terrorism has added impetus to these efforts, but there is still a need for better cooperation on projects and to harmonize the collection of seizure statistics between key international bodies.