Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides a historical context of US drug war policies in Latin America in the twentieth century. It examines US policy in two of the largest producers of coca in the world-Peru and Bolivia. Various radical scholars have rejected mainstream interpretations of US foreign drug policies. Various radical scholars have rejected mainstream interpretations of US foreign drug policies. Death, displacement, and corruption have all been the result of attempts to prohibit- or facilitate- the production, distribution, and consumption of illegal psychoactive substances. In the case of the Merida Initiative, for decades the Mexican state has been viewed as closely tied to different drug trafficking organizations on the local, state, and national levels. The connections between drug trafficking paramilitary groups and the Colombian armed forces had been documented by human rights organizations for decades prior to Plan Colombia.