Departing from largely ineffective medically-oriented approaches to the problems of drug abuse/education, the contributors to this volume present relevant empirical findings and theoretical models within a comprehensive psychosocial framework, which draws upon recent advances in understanding the physiological, psychological, interpersonal, and social forces that are the causes of youthful drug addiction.

From the local to the global, the governance of illegal drug use is becoming increasingly fragmented. In some contexts, prohibitive regimes are being transformed or replaced, while in others there are renewed commitments to criminalized control. But what gives rise to convergence and divergence in processes of policy making, both across different countries as well as within them? Based upon empirical qualitative research with 'elite' insiders, David Brewster explores a diverse range of cannabis policy approaches across the globe. His original analysis reveals the factors which facilitate or hinder punitive or liberalising tendencies in cannabis policy processes, concluding with future directions for policy making and comparative criminology.

Genuine Christianity is more than a set of beliefs--it is a relationship with Jesus Christ that involves hearing His voice and following His directions. But how does one do this? What tools or spiritual disciplines enable Christians to live out their lives in dynamic submission to God's will? Perhaps no set of principles is better suited to help Christians hear God's voice and submit to His will than the Twelve Steps.

As a Christian who practices the Steps, Saul Selby knows them to be an invaluable tool for living out the Christian faith. Selby brings his knowledge to bear in "Twelve Step Christianity," which teaches Christians in recovery to connect their faith with their program--and shows any Christian a clear path to a more intimate relationship with Christ. Laid out in a workbook format, with room for readers to write answers and track their progress, "Twelve Step Christianity" explores the roots of Twelve Step spirituality, examines the connections and distinctions between Christianity and Twelve Step programs, and offers readers a deeper and broader understanding of the myriad of powerful reasons for applying the Twelve Steps to their lives.

Trauma, trauma-related disorders, substance use, and addictive disorders often co-occur, and frequently play a role in the problems and issues that social workers contend with in their practice with individuals, families, and communities. Research shows that there is a relationship between trauma-related symptoms and problematic use of substances and other addictive behaviors. Individuals who experience these co-occurring problems have better outcomes when their issues are addressed with integrated treatment approaches. Trauma-informed care and trauma-specific treatment are therefore important components of effective social work interventions. This book examines various types of trauma, such as intergenerational trauma, adverse childhood events, childhood sexual abuse, and minority stress, amongst various populations and settings, including Native Americans, homeless youth, drug court participants, and LGB adolescents. It also explores the challenges in delivering trauma services in outpatient addiction treatment settings. Furthermore, it provides practical information on how to implement trauma-informed approaches in addiction treatment, and offers insights into the experience of a trauma survivor who is also recovering from a substance use disorder. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Social Work Practice in the Addictions.

This proposed book draws on the expertise of 35 experts in the field of Addiction Medicine to provide the reader with a current and comprehensive view of addiction as related to women, pregnancy, newborns, infants and children. The volume begins by placing current attitudes towards addicted women in a historical context, and continues with contributions on the relationship of gender to substance abuse research, addiction as a general health issue in women, and ethical dilemmas faced when approaching drug use during pregnancy. The volume discusses high-risk pregnancies and HIV infection related to maternal drug abuse. It details specific pharmacotherapy such as methadone and buprenorphine, and assesses society's punitive view toward illicit drug using women. Finally, the book describes outcomes of newborns, infants and children born following intrauterine drug exposure. Health providers in many related disciplines, specialists in Addiction Medicine, social workers and ethicists are among those who will gain insight into the complex interdisciplinary matrix of abuse in women, its unique relationship to pregnancy, and its impact on drug-exposed children. This book was published as a special issue in the Journal of Addictive Diseases.

This authoritative overview of drugs and society today examines: whether a process of `normalization' of drugs and drug use is under way; the debate over prohibition versus legislation; `drugs' and `users' as `other' or `dangerous'; drugs and dance cultures; drug use among young women; images of `race' and drugs; medical responses to drugs; policing strategies and controlling drug users; drug control and sport; and the question of prohibition versus liberalization.

First published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Now you can discover for yourself the principles behind the Twelve Steps as they occur in Scripture through this best-selling New Testament.

You will find an introduction to the Twelve Steps of recovery with each step listing recovery meditations and related recovery scriptures. As you read and meditate on Serenity, you will begin to see how the God of the Bible speaks directly to your needs. He will liberate you from debilitating addictions to restore you to wholeness and a perfect relationship with Him.

This book explores Russia's stunning success of ushering in the space age by launching Sputnik and beating the United States into space. It also examines the formation of NASA, the race for human exploration of the moon, the reality of global satellite communications, and a new generation of scientific spacecraft that began exploring the universe. An introductory essay by Pulitzer Prize winner Walter A. McDougall sets the context for Sputnik and its significance at the end of the twentieth century.

Alcohol and its consumption is a major topic for public policy-making. Growing awareness of alcohol-related health problems among the general public has led to high levels of interest in alcohol consumption and its impact on society. This innovative collection of new perspectives on this critically important issue is informed by a leading group of international social scientists. Topics covered include alcoholism, the family, minimum pricing, paternalistic controls, and Socially Responsible Investment programs. Together, these essays reveal illuminating new insights into how public policy might be improved.

This book was originally published as a special issue of "Contemporary Social Science."

Stop the Chaos, a comprehensive, practical guide, identifies the telltale signs of addiction, offers suggestions for living alcohol-or drug-free, and teaches the skills necessary for healthy thinking and living.

A former drug addict turned behavioural neuroscientist reveals how drugs work in the brain ― and what we can do to fight addiction.

Judith Grisel was a daily drug user when she began to consider that her addiction might have a cure, one that she herself could perhaps discover by studying the brain. Now, after twenty-five years as a neuroscientist, she shares what she and other scientists have learned about addiction, enriched by captivating glimpses of her personal journey.

In Never Enough, Grisel reveals the unfortunate bottom line of all regular drug use: there is no such thing as a free lunch. All drugs act on the brain in a way that diminishes their enjoyable effects and creates unpleasant ones with repeated use. Delving into the science of one of the world’s most pressing health problems, she reveals what is different about the brains of addicts even before they first pick up a drink or drug, and highlights the changes that take place in the brain and behaviour as a result of chronic using.

With compassion and clarity, Grisel describes what drove her to addiction, what helped her recover, and her belief that a ‘cure’ for addiction will not be found in our individual brains but in the way we interact with our communities.

This book describes how a group of young people make decisions about drug taking. It charts the decision making process of recreational drug takers and non-drug takers as they mature from adolescence into young adulthood. With a focus upon their perceptions of different drugs, it situates their decision making within the context of their everyday lives. Changing lives, changing drug journeys presents qualitative longitudinal data collected from interviewees at age 17, 22 and 28 and tracks the onset of drug journeys, their persistence, change and desistance. The drug journeys and the decision making process which underpins them are analysed by drawing upon contemporary discourses of risk and life course criminology. In doing so, a new theoretical framework is developed to help us understand drug taking decision making in contemporary society. This framework highlights the pleasures and risks that interviewees perceive when making decisions whether or not to take drugs. The ways in which their drug journeys and life journeys intersect and how social relationships and transitions to adulthood facilitate or constrain the decision making process are also explored. Qualitative longitudinal research of this kind is uncommon yet it provides an invaluable insight into the decision making process of individuals during the life course. The book will, therefore, be of interest to researchers and students from a variety of disciplines including qualitative research methods as well as sociology, criminology, cultural and health studies. It will also be an important resource for professionals working in health promotion, drugs education, harm reduction and treatment.

In older cultures, the use of intoxicant drugs was integrated into the rhythms of social existence and bounded by rituals and taboos that ensured their dangerous forces were contained and channelled. In modern western societies, by contrast, the state and the institutions of society have washed their hands of any responsibility for assimilating the desire for intoxication into social existence, and by doing so have sponsored a free-for-all that has often had disastrous consequences for individuals and communities alike. Why We Take Drugs provides a timely intervention in the growing debate about the wisdom of the ongoing 'war on drugs'. Rather than adopting the assumption that drug and alcohol use is a problem that poses a threat to society, this book makes a case for the idea that society is a problem for intoxicant drug use and that it is society that poses a threat, by denying those who seek intoxication a legitimate and socially sanctioned space in which to experience these altered states. Scholarly yet approachable, it provides a new understanding of the meaning and role of intoxicant drug use in contemporary society, setting an in-depth phenomenological analysis of intoxication as an embodied experience within a wide sociological, anthropological and historical context. These ideas are brought to life by intimate and revealing accounts of ordinary drug users' experiences with a wide range of substances. This book will appeal to a wide range of students and scholars throughout the social sciences, particularly in the areas of drug and alcohol studies, body studies, cultural studies, anthropology and philosophy.

Mutual-help groups have proliferated, diversified and adapted to emerging substance-related trends over the past 75 years, and have been the focus of rigorous research for the past 30 years. This book reviews the history of mutual support groups for addiction that have arisen as adjuncts or alternatives to Twelve Step Programs, including secular mutual support groups like Secular Organization for Sobriety, Smart Recovery and Women for Sobriety, and faith-based mutual support groups like Celebrate Recovery. It also considers the mutual support groups attended by families and friends of addicts. These mutual support groups are examined in terms of their histories, theoretical underpinnings and intended communities. The structures common in mutual support groups have influenced the rise of a new recovery advocacy movement and new recovery community institutions such as recovery ministries, recovery community centers, sober cafes, sober sports clubs, and recovery-focused projects in music, theatre and the arts. This volume explores how collectively, these trends reflect the cultural and political awakening of people in recovery and growing recognition and celebration of multiple pathways of long-term addiction recovery. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Groups in Addiction and Recovery.

The consumption of drugs and alcohol, and the pleasures and problems arising from this consumption, can be understood as embedded and constitutive elements of social, family, and recreational life. At the same time, they are key sites of intervention for a broad array of state and non-state actors focused on regulation, treatment, and recovery. This edited volume showcases current research on the complex social and cultural geographies of drugs and alcohol. Taking an avowedly critical approach, the authors draw from a variety of theoretical traditions to explore the socially and spatially embedded nature of alcohol and drug consumption, regulation and treatment, and the ways in which these give rise to particular lived experiences, while foreclosing on others. Together, the chapters question taken-for-granted assumptions about the nature of, and motivations for, drug and alcohol use, and pay direct attention to both the intended and unintended consequences of regulation and treatment initiatives. Despite and, in part, because of this critical stance, chapters hold immediate implications for drug and alcohol policy and public health interventions. This book was originally published as a special issue of Social and Cultural Geography.

Crack cocaine users have significant health problems, and place a significant burden on social services, the criminal justice system and drug treatment agencies. Among policymakers, professionals and the wider section of society, they are the most poorly understood drug-using group and have the worst retention rate in prison drug programmes and community drug agencies. This book is about their addictions and the realities of their lives. Based on ethnographic research (observation and interviewing) conducted in south London, it aims to highlight their day-to-day struggles as they attempt to survive in a violent and intimidating street drug scene while trying to make changes to their lives. The book unpacks the myths and stigma of their drug use, highlighting their fragile position in society in an effort to better understand them. With the help of several key characters, the book uses their words and experiences to take the reader on a journey through their crack addiction from a life in and out of crack houses, their experiences with law enforcement and welfare agencies to their life aspirations. The findings have important policy implications, and are relevant and accessible to academics and students in the field of criminology, sociology, psychology, and research methods. The research is equally relevant for central and local government policymakers, and frontline healthcare and drug agency staff.

This book focuses on the use of drugs in our lives and how we respond to them. Whereas drug policy typically centres on the problems of illicit drugs or licit drugs used in illicit ways or circumstances, Contemporary Drug Policy instead considers the wide variety of substances we call drugs as a normal part of our personal and social experience and asks how and when drugs benefit us as well as how and when they are harmful. The evidence is clear that at some times, in some circumstances, and in some places drugs are a problem. This book does not ignore these issues but shifts our attention to making policies that also recognize their legitimate and constructive place in society. It focuses on asking questions, challenging assumptions, and developing responses to drugs based on evidence from scientific study as directed by critical criminological theory rather than mainstream theory or unfounded assumptions. Different from other books on drug policy, this book does not offer answers or solutions. Rather it shows how critical criminological theories can lead scientific research in new directions supportive of policies that offer both solutions to problems that are found to be related to drugs and an appreciation for the benefits that drugs can bring to people and society. This book will be of interest to those studying or researching drug policy as well as professionals involved in policy making processes.

Inform and improve your practice with this comprehensive resource on cannabis use and abuse A Practitioner's Guide to Cannabis expertly cuts through the political and cultural noise surrounding cannabis use and provides a relevant, timely, and agnostic analysis of cannabis use and abuse. Incisive and insightful, this book assists behavioral health practitioners to increase their skills in screening, assessment, and intervention while helping them to adopt evidence-based practices. Health care providers will come to rely on this comprehensive resource to understand the risks of cannabis use and to provide a set of intervention strategies effective in a variety of settings. The book covers topics crucial for understanding the work of behavioral health and health practitioners dealing with cannabis issues, including: the complexities of cannabis science our cultural interpretations of the use of cannabis the risks involved with cannabis use effective interventions patients' expressions of their own "biopsychosocial" experience The book is perfect for social workers, psychologists, professional counselors, alcohol/drug counselors, and providers of health care, including physicians, nurses, and physician's assistants.

Khat, marijuana, peyote--are these dangerous drugs or vilified plants with rich cultural and medical values? In this book, Lisa Gezon brings the drug debate into the 21st century, proposing criteria for evaluating psychotropic substances. Focusing on khat, whose bushy leaves are an increasingly popular stimulant and the target of vehement anti-drug campaigns, she explores biocultural and socioeconomic contexts on local, national, and global levels. Gezon provides a multi-disciplinary examination of the plant's direct physical and psychological effects, as well as indirect social and structural effects on income and labor productivity, identity, gendered relationships, global drug discourses, and food security. This sophisticated, multileveled analysis cuts through the traditional battle lines of the drug debate and is a model for understanding and evaluating psychotropic substances around the world.

Khat, marijuana, peyote-are these dangerous drugs or vilified plants with rich cultural and medical values? In this book, Lisa Gezon brings the drug debate into the 21st century, proposing criteria for evaluating psychotropic substances. Focusing on khat, whose bushy leaves are an increasingly popular stimulant and the target of vehement anti-drug campaigns, she explores biocultural and socioeconomic contexts on local, national, and global levels. Gezon provides a multidisciplinary examination of the plant's direct physical and psychological effects, as well as indirect social and structural effects on income and labor productivity, identity, gendered relationships, global drug discourses, and food security. This sophisticated, multi-leveled analysis cuts through the traditional battle lines of the drug debate and is a model for understanding and evaluating psychotropic substances around the world.

"War and Drugs" explores the relationship between military incursions and substance use and abuse throughout history. For centuries, drugs have been used to weaken enemies, stimulate troops to fight, and quell post-war trauma. They have also served as a source of funding for clandestine military and paramilitary activity. From the Opium Wars through the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, themes of colonialism, capitalism, and anticommunism have constructed the foundation for the current crisis of international drug trafficking and addiction. In addition to offering detailed geopolitical perspectives, this book explores the intergenerational trauma that follows military conflict and the rising tide of substance abuse among veterans, especially from the Vietnam and Iraq-Afghan eras. Addiction specialist Bergen-Cico raises important questions about the past and challenges us to consider new approaches in the future especially to that longest of U.S. wars: the erstwhile War on Drugs.

This book tells the inside story of Leary's early LSD research at Harvard. Known throughout the world as the guru who encouraged an entire generation to "turn on, tune in, and drop out", he draws on wit, humor, and skepticism to debunk the power of psychotherapy and to advocate reprogramming the brain with psychedelics. Discussing how various drugs affect the brain, how to change behavior, and how to develop creativity, he also delves into psychopharmacological catalyzing, fear of potential, symbol and language imprinting, and brain reimprinting with Hinduism, Buddhism, and LSD.

In recent years, the use of illegal substances has increased, particularly 'designer' drugs which have rapidly become part of youth culture. The need for all involved in drug control to have up to date information about the subject has never been greater. This book helps meet this need by providing a chemical background to the legal controls on drugs of abuse. Although focussed on the UK, some of the provisions of the Misuse of Drugs Act derive from international treaties; the discussion of technical aspects is therefore of wider relevance. Apart from the Act itself, the book also deals with certain aspects of the Misuse of Drugs Regulations. There is detailed coverage of 'designer drugs' and the generic legislation that was introduced to tackle them. The more recent addition of 35 'Ecstasy'-like substances is covered in depth. The significance to the legislation of terms such as salt, base, stereoisomer, ester, ether, derivative, homologue and isotope are described, and the text is supplemented by 23 Tables and over 80 chemical structures. There are eleven Appendices covering topics such as precursor chemicals, related legislation, stated cases, sentencing guidelines and the chemical characteristics of commonly-abused drugs. Up-to-date lists of controlled drugs, with cross references to their status in UN treaties, are provided and a number of pending and other possible changes to the Act are included together with a guide to nomenclature and synonyms. Although primarily aimed at forensic scientists, this book will be of great benefit to all bodies concerned with drug control, including the police, customs officers, lawyers and government departments.

Even though some school-based tobacco use prevention programs have proven successful, nearly all first use of tobacco occurs before high school graduation. In this volume the authors offer a health researcher's perspective on the history, status, and requirements of school-based tobacco use prevention and cessation research. They outline how to develop a research program and give practical guidelines on how to implement it. Following a brief overview of school-based prevention and cessation programs, they describe the development and implementation of Project Towards No Tobacco Use (TNT), and address major theoretical and methodological issues. The specific issues they address include developing and selecting good programs; developing the curriculum; examining the social influences of etiology; and selecting, assigning, and teaching subjects. Researchers and practitioners in public health, especially those involved in adolescent tobacco programs and health promotion will find this volume particularly interesting.