Cannabis Prevalence and National Drug Policy in 27 Countries: An Analysis of Adolescent Substance Use

Abstract

Prior research that assesses the relationship between cannabis policy and prevalence rates has yielded mixed results, perhaps due to the varying rigor of these investigations. Addressing some of these issues in rigor and informed by a rational choice theory (RCT), we hypothesize that those policies on the more punitive end of McDonald and colleagues’ classification will be most effective. Examining legislation in 27 countries utilizing the Second International Self-Report Delinquency Study (ISRD-2) through hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) models with both individual- and country-level controls, we find little support for these hypotheses. Instead, results from our analysis largely indicate that the variation in country prevalence rates from 2005 to 2007 was not significantly related to cannabis control policy. We comment on possible policy implications for these preliminary results.

Keywords

cannabis adolescents legislation cross-national HLM drug policy rational choice theory

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Anderson

D. M.

Hansen

Rees

D. I.

(2015). Medical marijuana laws and teen marijuana use. American Law and Economics Review, 17, 495-528.

Bachman

J. G.

Johnston

L. D.

O’Malley

P. M.

(1981). Smoking, drinking, and drug use among American high school students: Correlates and trends, 1975-1979. American Journal of Public Health, 71, 59-69.

Baker

Goh

(2004). The cannabis cautioning scheme three years on: An implementation and outcome evaluation. Sydney, Australia: New South Wales Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research.

Beccaria

(1764). On crimes and punishments (p. 39). Puolucci

(trans.). Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill.

Becker

G. S.

(1968). Crime and punishment: An economic approach. Journal of Political Economy, 76(2), 169-217

Bentham

(1789). Principles of Morals and Legislation. Oxford, UK: Blackwell.

Bollinger

(2005). Symbolic criminal law without limits: Commentary on the cannabis decision of the German Federal Constitutional Court. Retrieved from https://cifas.us/symbolic-criminal-law-without-limits/

Cerdá

Wall

Keyes

K. M.

Galea

Hasin

(2012). Medical marijuana laws in 50 states: Investigating the relationship between state legalization of medical marijuana and marijuana use, abuse and dependence. Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 120(1), 22-27.

Cherpitel

C. J.

Bond

Borges

Chou

Nilsen

. . . Xiang

(2012). Multi-level analysis of alcohol-related injury and drinking pattern: Emergency department data from 19 countries. Addiction, 107, 1263-1272.

10.

Cornish

Clarke

(1986). Situational prevention, displacement of crime and rational choice theory. In Heal

Laycock

(Eds.), Situational crime prevention: From theory into practice, 1-16. London: HMSO.

11.

Cohen

Kaal

(2001). The irrelevance of drug policy: Patterns and careers of experienced cannabis use in the populations of Amsterdam, San Francisco and Bremen. Amsterdam, the Netherlands: CEDRO/Universiteit van Amsterdam.

12.

Cook

Zhou

Kelso-Chichetto

Janelle

Morano

Somboonwit

. . . Bryant

(2017). Alcohol consumption patterns and HIV viral suppression among persons receiving HIV care in Florida: An observational study. Addiction Science & Clinical Practice, 12(1), Article 22.

13.

Cook

W. K.

Bond

Greenfield

T. K.

(2014). Are alcohol policies associated with alcohol consumption in low-and middle-income countries? Addiction, 109, 1081-1090.

14.

Dahlström

Teorell

Dahlberg

Hartmann

Lindberg

Nistotskaya

(2015). The QoG expert survey dataset II. Gothenburg, Sweden: Quality of Government Institute.

15.

Decorte

Mortelmans

Tieberghien

De Moor

(2009). Drug use: Overview of general population surveys in Europe. Lisbon, Portugal: European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction.

16.

Degenhardt

Ferrari

Hall

(2017). The global epidemiology and disease burden of cannabis use and dependence. In Preedy

(Ed.), Handbook of cannabis and Related Pathologies: Biology, pharmacology, diagnosis, and treatment (pp. 89-100). London, UK: Elsevier.

17.

Degenhardt

Hall

Lynskey

(2001). Alcohol, cannabis and tobacco use among Australians: A comparison of their associations with other drug use and use disorders, affective and anxiety disorders, and psychosis. Addiction, 96, 1603-1614.

18.

de Zwart

Van Laar

. (2001). Cannabis regimes. The British Journal of Psychiatry, 178, 574-575.

19.

Enders

C. K.

Bandalos

D. L.

(2001). The relative performance of full information maximum likelihood estimation for missing data in structural equation models. Structural Equation Modeling, 8, 430-457.

20.

European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction. (2005). Annual report 2005: The state of the drugs problem in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.

21.

European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction. (2018). European report 2018: Trends and developments. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.

22.

Fergusson

Lynskey

Horword

(1993). Patterns of cannabis use among 13-14 year old New Zealanders. The New Zealand Medical Journal, 106, 247-250.

23.

Fleming

C. B.

Guttmannova

Cambron

Rhew

I. C.

Oesterle

(2016). Examination of the divergence in trends for adolescent marijuana use and marijuana-specific risk factors in Washington State. Journal of Adolescent Health, 59, 269-275.

24.

Greenfield

P. M.

Suzuki

L. K.

Rothstein-Fisch

(2006). Cultural pathways through human development. In Renninger

K. A.

Sigel

I. E.

Damon

Lerner

R. M.

(Eds.), Handbook of child psychology: Child psychology in practice (pp. 655-699). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley.

25.

Greenwald

(2009). Drug decriminalization in Portugal: Lessons for creating fair and successful drug policies. Washington, DC: CATO Institute.

26.

Hall

Pacula

R. L.

(2003). Cannabis use and dependence: Public health and public policy. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

27.

Hall

W. D.

Lynskey

(2005). Is cannabis a gateway drug? Testing hypotheses about the relationship between cannabis use and the use of other illicit drugs. Drug and Alcohol Review, 24, 39-48.

28.

Hasin

D. S.

Wall

Keyes

K. M.

Cerdá

Schulenberg

O’Malley

P. M.

. . . Feng

(2015). Medical marijuana laws and adolescent marijuana use in the USA from 1991 to 2014: Results from annual, repeated cross-sectional surveys. The Lancet Psychiatry, 2, 601-608.

29.

Hibell

Guttormsson

Ahlström

Balakireva

Bjarnason

Kokkevi

Kraus

(2009). The 2007 ESPAD report: Substance use among students in 36 European countries. Stockholm: The Swedish Council for Information on Alcohol and Other Drugs.

30.

Hibell

Guttormsson

Ahlström

Balakireva

Bjarnason

Kokkevi

Kraus

(2012). The 2011 ESPAD report: Substance use among students in 36 European countries. Stockholm: The Swedish Council for Information on Alcohol and Other Drugs.

31.

Hughes

C. E.

Stevens

(2012). A resounding success or a disastrous failure: Re-examining the interpretation of evidence on the Portuguese decriminalisation of illicit drugs. Drug and Alcohol Review, 31, 101-113.

32.

Junger-Tas

(2012). Delinquent behaviour in 30 countries. In Junger-Tas

Marshall

I. H.

Enzmann

Killias

Steketee

Gruszczynska

(Eds.), The many faces of youth crime: Contrasting theoretical perspectives on juvenile delinquency across countries and cultures (pp. 69-93). New York, NY: Springer.

33.

Junger-Tas

Marshall

I. H.

Enzmann

Killias

Steketee

Gruszczynska

(2012). The many faces of youth crime: Contrasting theoretical perspectives on juvenile delinquency across countries and cultures (pp. 329-353). New York, NY: Springer.

34.

Kilmer

(2002). Cannabis 2002 report. In Do cannabis possession laws influence cannabis use (pp. 101-122). Retrieved from http://hemp-info.ch/info/pdf/cannabis2002report.pdf#page=100

35.

Kilmer

Pacula

R. L.

(2017). Understanding and learning from the diversification of cannabis supply laws. Addiction, 112, 1128-1135.

36.

Kilmer

Reuter

Giommoni

(2015). What can be learned from cross-national comparisons of data on illegal drugs? Crime and Justice, 44, 227-296.

37.

Kisely

(2005). A tale of two jurisdictions. Can Australia and Canada learn from each other’s experience with cannabis control? Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 39, 154-160.

38.

Korf

D. J.

(2002). Dutch coffee shops and trends in cannabis use. Addictive Behaviors, 27, 851-866.

39.

Lenton

(2011). Reforming laws applying to domestic cannabis production as a harm reduction strategy—A case study. In Decorte

Potter

Bouchard

(Eds.), World wide weed: Global trends in cannabis cultivation and its control (pp. 197-213). UK: MPG Books Group. Retrieved from https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=APcwgQo4MGAC&oi=fnd&pg=PA197&dq=Reforming+laws+applying+to+domestic+cannabis+production+as+a+harm+reduction+strategy%E2%80%94A+case+study&ots=YWxumgCyI4&sig=G2nHVcksl-9hB2IanEMf9Alat1c#v=onepage&q=Reforming%20laws%20applying%20to%20domestic%20cannabis%20production%20as%20a%20harm%20reduction%20strategy%E2%80%94A%20case%20study&f=false

40.

Lenton

(2000). Cannabis policy and the burden of proof: Is it now beyond reasonable doubt that cannabis prohibition is not working? Drug and Alcohol Review, 19, 95-100.

41.

Loughran

T. A.

Paternoster

Chalfin

Wilson

(2016). Can rational choice be considered a general theory of crime? Evidence from individual-level panel data. Criminology, 54, 86-112.

42.

MacCoun

Reuter

(1997). Interpreting Dutch cannabis policy: Reasoning by analogy in the legalization debate. Science, 278(5335), 47-52.

43.

MacCoun

Reuter

(2001). Evaluating alternative cannabis regimes. The British Journal of Psychiatry, 178, 123-128.

44.

Marshall

I. H.

Enzmann

(2012). Methodology and design of the ISRD-2 study. In Junger-Tas

Marshall

I. H.

Enzmann

Killias

Steketee

Gruszczynska

(Eds.), The many faces of youth crime: Contrasting theoretical perspectives on juvenile delinquency across countries and cultures (pp. 21-65). New York, NY: Springer.

45.

McDonald

Moore

Norberry

Wardlaw

Ballenden

(1994). Legislative options for cannabis in Australia. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service.

46.

Melchior

Chollet

Glangeaud-Freudenthal

Saurel-Cubizolles

M.-J.

Dufourg

M.-N.

Van der Waerden

Sutter-Dallay

A.-L.

(2015). Tobacco and alcohol use in pregnancy in France: The role of migrant status: The nationally representative ELFE study. Addictive Behaviors, 51, 65-71.

47.

Nguyen

Malm

Bouchard

(2015). Production, perceptions, and punishment: Restrictive deterrence in the context of cannabis cultivation. International Journal of Drug Policy, 26, 267-276.

48.

O’Brien

(2015). Legalized marijuana use doesn’t apply to college student-athletes. College Athletics and the Law, 12(4), 1-3.

49.

Pacula

R. L.

Chriqui

J. F.

King

(2003). Marijuana decriminalization: What does it mean in the United States? NBER Working Paper No. 9690. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.

50.

Palamar

J. J.

Ompad

D. C.

Petkova

(2014). Correlates of intentions to use cannabis among US high school seniors in the case of cannabis legalization. International Journal of Drug Policy, 25, 424-435.

51.

Parsi

(2014). Testing madness: Shifting from a punitive approach to a therapeutic one. The American Journal of Bioethics, 14(12), 1-2.

52.

Quah

Collins

Atuesta Becerra

Caulkins

Csete

Drucker

. . . Mejia

(2014). Ending the drug wars: Report of the LSE Expert Group on the economics of drug policy. London, UK: LSE Ideas, The London School of Economics and Political Science.

53.

Raudenbush

Bryk

Congdon

(2004). HLM6: Hierarchical linear and nonlinear modeling. Lincolnwood, IL: Scientific Software International.

54.

Raudenbush

S. W.

Bryk

A. S.

(2002). Hierarchical linear models: Applications and data analysis methods (Vol. 1). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

55.

Reuband

K.-H.

(2008). Trends in patterns of consumption and limited effects of penal policies: The case of Germany. Déviance et Société, 32, 303-323.

56.

Ritter

Livingston

Chalmers

Berends

Reuter

(2016). Comparative policy analysis for alcohol and drugs: Current state of the field. International Journal of Drug Policy, 31, 39-50.

57.

Rodman

(2014). From criminalization to regulation: New classifications of cannabis necessitate reform of United Nations drug treaties. Brooklyn Journal of International Law, 40, 647-683.

58.

Room

(2010). Cannabis policy: Moving beyond stalemate. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

59.

Room

Fischer

Hall

Lenton

Reuter

(2008). The global cannabis commission report. Oxford, UK: Beckley Foundation.

60.

Saffer

Chaloupka

(1999). The demand for illicit drugs. Economic Inquiry, 37, 401-411.

61.

Single

(1999). Options for cannabis reform. International Journal of Drug Policy, 10, 281-290.

62.

Single

Christie

Ali

(2000). The impact of cannabis decriminalisation in Australia and the United States. Journal of Public Health Policy, 21, 157-186.

63.

Smart

R. G.

Ogborne

A. C.

(2000). Drug use and drinking among students in 36 countries. Addictive Behaviors, 25, 455-460.

64.

Stevens

(2010). Drugs, crime and public health: The political economy of drug policy. Abingdon, UK: Routledge.

65.

Strang

Witton

Hall

(2000). Improving the quality of the cannabis debate: Defining the different domains. British Medical Journal, 320(7227), 108-110.

66.

Thies

C. F.

C. A.

(1993). Decriminalization of marijuana and the demand for alcohol, marijuana and cocaine. The Social Science Journal, 30, 385-399.

67.

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. (2009). World drug report. New York, NY: United Nations.

68.

Van Laar

Frijns

Trautmann

Lombi

. (2013). Cannabis market: User types, availability and consumption estimates. In Trautmann

Kilmer

Turnbull

(Eds.), Further insights into aspects of the eu illicit drugs market. Luxembourg: European Commission, Directorate-General for Justice.

69.

Van Solinge

T. B

. (2004). Dealing with drugs in Europe: An investigation of European drug control experiences: France, the Netherlands and Sweden. The Hague, the Netherlands: Willem Pompe Institute for Criminal Law and Criminology.

70.

Vaughn

M. G.

Salas-Wright

C. P.

DeLisi

Maynard

B. R.

(2014). The immigrant paradox: Immigrants are less antisocial than native-born Americans. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 49, 1129-1137.

71.

Wodak

Drummond

Reinarman

Cohen

P. D. A.

(2002). Cannabis control: Costs outweigh the benefits. British Medical Journal, 324(7329), 105-108. doi:10.1136/bmj.324.7329.105