ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the case for new responses to transnational threats to security that move beyond state-centric models by evaluating the history of US and international responses to the challenges posed by the illegal smuggling of cocaine and heroin. It documents the limits of attacking a transnational threat with largely state centric models. The chapter explores the patterned emergence of unintended consequences in the wake of these state centric approaches, a costly phenomenon that bolsters the argument for new approaches to the problem. The United States has since at least 1911 pursued policies with respect to cocaine that emphasize tight controls in source countries. Drug trafficking has long been a particularly challenging issue in the complex relationship between the United States and Mexico. The displacement of the drug trafficking threat poses a clear challenge to state-centric approaches to drug trafficking.
