Social Justice: Catholic Social Teaching and the US War on Drugs - Essay Example

Those who are in ity rightly tolerate certain evils, lest certain goods be lost, or certain evils be incurred, If you do away with harlots, theworld will be convulsed with lust. Augustine [De ordine 2.4] 1.0 INTRODUCTION There is a rich tradition of social justice theory within the Catholic faith, which has evolved throughout the centuries to apply to contemporary societal problems. The historic evolution of this body of literature has met with many challenges in order to continue to address and provide guidance for the profound complexities brought on by modernity. Nowhere has this presented more of a challenge than in applying Catholic social thought to problems surrounding global criminal justice. Within the field of criminal justice, one of the most difficult areas to apply Catholic social justice paradigms rests in the contradictions inherent in the United States international drug control policies that vilify users and producers around the world. Before we begin to examine this difficult question, perhaps we might explore the fundamental elements of Catholic social justice that will enable us to creatively deconstruct the weakness of the US War on Drugs. Within the framework of Catholicism, social justice has been referred to as the struggle for communal righteousness or fairness. It rests on the premise that a just and ethical life is built on a foundation beyond the mere administration of laws that sanction offenders, and entails the intentional construction of creative communities where fairness or righteousness is attained among the members concerning what some world perceive as utopian ways of life. 1 Community needs take precedence over individual needs, while humanity is seen as socially constructed through a combination of ethical and moral sacrifices for the common good. This common good transcends far beyond the re-distribution of individual material comforts as proposed by secular socialist ideologies, in lieu of more non-material, immeasurable, esoteric benefits for the entire community. There is currently little consensus among Catholics on how to achieve these lofty goals however, because the process to identify, accomplish, and prioritize these social justice goals remains highly elusive. Yet despite environmental impediments, there are several interesting contemporary applications that attempt to explicate the process of social justice in a transparent and creative fashion. One such example is the International Green Party. The International Green Party has identified Catholic social justice as one of its’ four pillars of support. This strategy has enabled the Greens to unify its members, articulate concrete strategies to accomplish its’ ethical political platform, become a powerful force on the political tapestry of a rapidly-evolving European Union, and enabled the party to recommend social justice policies worldwide. How have the Greens managed to generate so much interest despite fluctuating economic conditions, pervasive language barriers, and an ever-expanding national membership of nation-states ? Catholic social teachings incorporate the features of Catholic church principles that relate to features surrounding kindness. 2 One of the distinguishing aspects of these teachings is its advocacy for the poorest associates of the community. Advocacy of the profoundly disenfranchised is derived from seven social aspects of community, including: holiness of human being and self-respect of the individual, call to family, neighborhood and contribution, privileges and responsibilities, privileged option for the deprived and susceptible, self-respect of work and the rights of people, harmony and the concern for Gods formation. In order to examine these foundational elements of Catholic social justice theory in greater detail, the analysis will explore these and other relevant paradigmatic frameworks in relation to the war on drugs in the United States. 3 2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW The United States War on Drugs is one of the most costly and ineffective campaigns in modern history. It is full of contradictions, and has provided analysts with a plethora of material by which to examine the nation from a critical perspective. From official definitions, the US War on Drugs is the campaign to prevent illicit substances from circulating around the globe. One important element is its’ prevention orientation requiring international cooperation of many nations around the world. This cooperation is elicited in order to minimize consumption of illegal drugs by citizens of the US, described as morally weak. 4 These international agreements were created with the intention of prohibiting and criminalizing the production, transportation, and distribution of illegal substances that are defined as dangerous or undesirable by criminal justice system authorities in the United States. Catholic social thought can assist us in deconstructing the contradictions, paradoxes, and inconsistencies inherent in these international policies that, while perhaps originally well-intentioned, have evolved into very costly and ineffective policies that are wreaking havoc throughout the world. To that end, I will provide an outline of Catholic social teachings as applied to the war on drugs in the United States, describe the paradoxical vilification of consumers and producers of drugs, as well as examine the church and its’ potential in improving drug control policies worldwide for the benefit of the planet. 2.1 MILESTONES IN CATHOLIC SOCIAL THOUGHT The foundation of Catholic principles advancing ideology surrounding the collective happiness of humankind is believed to have been founded by the Pope Leo XIII’s in the year 1891 in his encyclical communication known as the Rerum Novarum. This was an unwrapped letter which was approved by all Bishops concentrating on the situation of the lower classes. 5 The encyclical illustrated the rights, responsibilities, and resources by which Catholics could and should engage in activities toward an ethical life. The letter discusses behaviors among classes and common responsibilities of the populace transcending beyond government administration and the polity. This work argued for the need for workers to unify to better advocate on behalf of their needs, called for the dismantling of socialism as well as unregulated market economies, and secured the Church’s position in support of the accumulation of private property and the privilege of personal possessions. 6 Industrialization and related class conflict was examined in light of deteriorating labor conditions, indicted capitalists for their exploitation of workers of the world, and incited the working classes to demand for better conditions for their survival under existing conditions. Pope John Paul II came up with another encyclical known as the Laborem Exercens in the year 1981 which concentrated on individual labor. This work made significant contribution to the contemporary evolution of Catholic social theory. 7 An updated version was later modified and reissued as Centesimus Annus in the year 1991 during the 100th celebration to commemorate the ground-breaking work of the Rerum Novarum. With this new literary treatment in a time of intense global conflict brought on by the proliferation of totalitarian Communist regimes around the world. These difficulties also affected Pope John Paul II on a personal level, as the revolutionaries of the Solidarity Labor Movement in his own homeland of Poland hungered for the guiding principles outlined in his manuscript advancing these seven fundamental principles of ethical living needed for humanity. 8 2.1.1 Holiness of Human Being and Self-Respect of the Individual. The first principle, holiness of the human being and self-respect of the individual, has turned out to be the preliminary standards of all of Catholic social teachings, in which the respect and self-esteem of all individuals are upheld for the highest standard. With this teaching, life has to be treasured more and takes precedence over any other material property on earth at any given time. In the treatment of the Popes John Paul II, he discussed, at length, the issue of the sacredness of the individual life and self esteem. This was clearly demonstrated in his encyclical named the Evangelium Vitae of which is a Latin name representing the “gospel of the life” which defined the value and sacredness of an individual life. 9 It is difficult to reconcile this is light of the sanctions associated with drug control policies in the United States. Nonviolent petty drug offenders for simple possession charges are placed in prison for very long periods under the clause formally known as “three strikes and you’re out.” In some countries, the US War on Drugs has given dictatorial regimes carte blanche to freely torture and kill those involved in trafficking of illegal substances. This tacit acceptance of international torture as a result of US drug policies (recently expanded under the CIA with the War on Terrorism) indicates that the United States “wars” on drugs and terrorism fulfills the criteria of special pleading. On the one hand, United States claims it is attempting to protect the rights and morality of US citizens, but does so through the implementation of policies that destroy the rights and morality of citizens in countries. Under the guise of safety, authoritarian regimes are guilty of worse human rights violations against their citizens then drug consumption sanctions in the United States. This represents a significant offense against the first principle of Catholic social justice theory, because poor people in these countries might have no other economic viability then to engage in marijuana or cocaine cultivation. Exacerbated by free trade agreements benefiting the US that prohibits small scale agrarian production, these global arrangements are a significant detriment to farmers. Although they are vilified by the US, often these rural peasants engage in cocaine or marijuana cultivation because they have no other choice for their survival. Their lives are not respected from either an economic justice perspective nor are they protected from harsh or inhumane sanctions brought on by the US War on Drugs. There are therefore, severe (intended or unintended) consequences of these policies that far exceed any psychological or social damages brought on by marijuana consumption. 2.1.2 Family, Neighborhood and Contribution. As we see in the book of Genesis, God saw it worthwhile for a man to have a partner on this earth, and thus, he created Eve for Adam. According to Catholic social teachings, this educates people that a man is not only consecrated but also he is regarded as a social being on earth10. Family remains, therefore, the foundation of a healthy and moral society; usually viewed as the relationship between a man a woman of who comes together with one aim of raising and nurturing children to form a family of which will give birth to a clan and later to the community, then to nation and later to the whole world. In the US War on Drugs, the pressures for rural peasants to support the material needs of their families is disregarded, as free trade agreements and poverty work against minimum substance levels of survival for the people living in these less developed regions of the world where marijuana and cocaine are cultivated. Despite the harsh penalties for importing illegal substances, the kinship unit and society cohesion remains under attack nevertheless. Special pleading occurs again through the contradictory support by the US government of artificially-produced pharmaceutical substances that provide the same effects of illegal organically-produced substances. Corporate research, often sponsored with funding by the same United States tax payer that supports these same border interdiction programs, enabled consumers to legal access the same pharmacological substances whose production and distribution is entirely controlled by US based industries. The community suffers insofar as the family and kinship systems are destroyed both through prison sanctions and related disintegration through incarceration, and again through addiction through legal artificial substances sponsored by the same government that criminalizes these organic forms abroad. 2.1.3 Privileges and Responsibilities. Individuals have minimal needs and rights that are required for their lives. With these, the rights of individuals have to be practiced in the correct way. Yet the poor farmer in Columbia who cannot engage in growing of conventional crops due to an absence of fair trade policies represents a significant offense against his human rights. Thus, the cultivation of these illegal substance might be argued to be a form of asserting his human right for economic vitality and survival. Preventing the peasant farmer from growing illegal crops represents a supply side intervention. On the other hand, the US War on Drugs might be better suited to examine the demand side of the equation. What is it about American culture that makes its citizens place such high demands for illegal drug consumption despite their criminalization ? Is escapism a human right ? If so, might we teach more productive and natural ways to achieve these states of transcendence without posing such high risks for health and community in the process ? 2.1.4 Privileged Option for the Deprived and Susceptible. Catholic social thought emphasizes that one should visit and help poor people. With this, the concentrating efforts to assist the needy helps them live a more holistic life. 11 Might one argue that poor people consuming drugs, produced by poor people producing drugs in other countries, is prohibited through policies that use poor people in the role of law enforcement to sanction offenders (through border interdiction and prison settings) that drives a system designed to creates profound distractions to the poor around the world so that they are unable to focus resistance to the real injustices behind their poverty ? 2.1.5 Self-Respect with regard to work Within this teaching, citizens are encouraged to respect their work and the work of their neighbors taking place in and out of their own nation. They encourage people to live positively and to respect others fully. Through this framework, one might argue that it is incumbent upon Catholics to work against bilateral free trade agreements that benefit rich countries to the detriment of the poor. Another solution would involve policies where non intervention would be in order, and nations become free to import and export goods and services as they like without any elite intervention through unfair trade policies. 2.1.6 Harmony. Catholic social teachings argue that harmony is one of the most important virtues for any society, and a major element that tries ties people together. In this principle, care for the collective ensures participants that they might live a better life. 12 If expenditures for border interdiction, surveillance, and sanctioning of international offenders were redirected through programs aimed at skills training, business development, education, and such; perhaps the cultivation of illegal substances would cease as levels of socioeconomic and cultural development would rise. Given the lucrative business interests surrounding the proliferation of guns, ships, and other accoutrements surrounding the War on Drugs, coupled with the privatization of prisons and jails around the world that house these ‘undesirable’ citizens, its’ no wonder that harmony is not one of the articulated goals of drug prevention programs, because too many financial interests are linked to these global anti-drug policy endeavors. 2.1.7 The Concern for Gods Formation. This principles encourages Catholics to think positively on the environment so that they can be able to protect it from harm. Here the well-being of people is contingent upon the well-being of the environment. Catholics are discouraged from exploiting the natural resources that has been provided to them by God. 13 Yet businesses composing the military industrial complex driving the War on Drugs are not prohibited from destroying the environment. 2.2 SUMMARIZING THE WAR ON DRUGS. In retrospect, the US War on Drugs policy has been an unmitigated failure from the point of view of social justice theory. But from the point of view of capitalist entrepreneurship and military analysts, it has been wildly successful. In the year 1994, the War on Drugs resulted in the imprisonment of approximately one million citizens for nonviolent offenses due to petty charges of possession of the marijuana. 14 To free prison spaces, hundreds of thousands of violent offenders with non-drug charges were released to the streets to make room for the new enemy of the state. This only intensified with the Merida initiative that integrated cooperative efforts among the United States and Mexican governments to heighten criminalization of drug trafficking offenses. To aid in this effort, billions of dollars were and continue to be devoted to military goods and services to secure the borders of the United States. 15 Judges often refused to participate in these sanctions, who came to be known as “activist judges.” Prior to his death from drug addiction, the Nixon administration partnered with one of the biggest celebrity drug addicts in Hollywood history, Elvis Presley, who was paradoxically appointed a moral leader in his job as ‘drug czar’ to combat addiction. The field of high profile drug prevention later became popular among presidential wives, commencing with Nancy Reagan. The next first lady, Barbara Bush, designed the “Just Say No” campaign, which opened an epoch of demand-based behavior modification that yielded little success. This campaign represented none of the principles outlined in social justice theory, and as such, failed to give American users any social-psychological framework or ethical guidance by which to approach the topic. Failure on the part of these persistently banal and superficial public information campaigns originating in Presidential cabinets at the highest administrative echelons of the federal government has inadvertently fueled public fears about drugs. In the absence of any comprehensive and cohesive social justice initiative, coupled with fear of criminal activity, addiction, poverty, and homelessness; the public’s willingness to support criminal preventative, rehabilitative, and punitive efforts have resulted in the allocation of 33% of the entire criminal justice budget of over $75 billion to local, state, and federal penitentiaries, prisons, and detention centers.16 Loading... Loading... 2.3 CATHOLIC SOCIAL TEACHINGS AND THE WAR ON DRUGS The US War on Drugs is clearly engaged in contradictory policies that generally fail to influence addicts or traffickers around the world. In the absence of leadership from United States authorities, the Catholic church has attempted to provide youth, the poor, and others vulnerable to addiction with the moral and ethical leadership and guidance they are seeking. Beyond literature espousing church doctrine on ethical living that deals with circumstances surrounding drug use, the Church has been involved in creating a network of addiction treatment programs around the world. Church-based prevention programs also take the form of recreational activities for youth such as Taize, whose membership involves thousands of Catholic young people determined to lead moral lives. Independent orders composed of activist nuns have participated in alterglobalization events and other nonviolent protests to articulate their position against imperial policies that operate to the detriment of the poor such as the US War on Drugs. Other initiatives such as the Council for Peace and Justice work regularly to articulate concrete objectives to implement social justice strategies locally. Many Catholic Universities such as Loyola have institutionalized these efforts in their pedagogy, incorporating social justice theory into nearly every aspect of epistemology. The Council of Churches also work together in concert with local and global Catholic organizations, reaching prevention and rehabilitative efforts and programs to those needing it the most, low income, uninsured addicts. These organizations, guided by encyclical principles, resist existing systemic arrangements that constantly vilify the real victim -- the poor and downtrodden drug addicted and drug producing people of the world, in the hope of unifying the marginalized to build a fair and justice society in the creation of a new world order. 2.4 CATHOLIC SOCIAL TEACHINGS FOR THE FUTURE The Church’s advocacy of the alienated and marginalized is expected to continue for the future. Human emancipation from drugs and other oppressive forces associated with their membership in disenfranchised groups will only become possible through their empowerment and continued resistance of their vilification. It is through this way that the Church follows in the tradition begun by St. Thomas Aquinas reconciling the external and internal thoughts of the sinner, that create improved conditions that will reduce his or her likelihood of engaging in risky or criminal behavior. The Church is expected to continue to work tirelessly to dismantle fears and reduce social distances for humanity, in order for empathy, harmony, ethics, and unity to drive our actions, thoughts, and behaviors as advanced by the beneficent principles driving Catholic social justice theories. It is only through critical policy explorations advanced by these social justice doctrines that we will be able to effectively deploy cohesive and effective programs and policies that address the destructive tendencies of disenfranchised drug users and producers reluctantly taking place around the world. BIBLIOGRAPHY Bicket W.K & DeGrandpre R.J (1996): Drug Policy & Human Nature: Psychological Perspective on the Prevention, Administration & Treatment of Unlawful Drug Abuse. Springer Amazon.com pp 324-350 Butler S (2002): Alcohol, Drugs & Health Promotion in Modern Ireland. Association of Communal Administration Amazon.com pp 10-25 Kramer F (2004): Liability Faith Fairness: An Introduction To Catholic Social Thoughts. Paulist Press Amazon.com pp115-120 KrierMich M.L (1998): CST and Movements. Twenty-Third Publications, Amazon com pp 200-205 Richard S (2001): Psychedelic Medicines: Science and the Public. Park Street Press Amazon.com pp 25-30 Rushefsky M.E (2001): Civic Guidelines In The US: At the Morning of the 21st Century. M.E Sharpe. Amazon.com pp 330-335 Sullivan F.A (1995): The Principle Burden Of Evangelium Vitae: Theological Learning. Vol 56 no. 3 pp 560-565. US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics - 1993 NCJ-148211 Read More