Abstract

LYNCH, Fernando M. LEGISLATION OF VICE: VICE OF LEGISLATION? A JURIDICAL HERMENEUTICS ON DRUG PROHIBITION. Int. Law: Rev. Colomb. Derecho Int. [online]. 2012, n.21, pp.55-90. ISSN 1692-8156.

This article presents a critical examination about the conditions of the current legal regime that dictates the prohibition of psychoactive drugs in our society. Considering in particular the unusual decision to sanction with criminal penalties for a conduct defined according to medical findings as a disease -which entails the virtual imposition of a double punishment, both natural and social-, we discuss various aspects of the remarkable situation of the legal anomaly that it has thus been caused. According to the data available on the high proportion of lack of proceedings of the penal sanction of consumers that have been detained, we highlight the hermeneutic problematic that refers to the significant tension between the generality of the law and its application in concrete cases. We consider ultimately the question if, in accordance with an ever greater questioning of the discriminatory criteria of the scientific-philosophical foundations of the current official policy, such a situation of lack of application of the law does not express but a rejection -implicit- of the injustice that is thus promoted.

Keywords : interpretation; drug; juridical; (lack of) application; Drug and narcotic control; legislation; drug abuse; drug depencence.

        · abstract in Spanish     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )