ABSTRACT
Introduction Illicit drugs are one of our greatest contemporary concerns. However, taking the long sweep of history, this is a fairly recent development (see Seddon, 2010). Most of the drugs now criminalised have only been so for something less than a century and in many cases much less than that. Two hundred years ago there was much more concern about alcohol, and drinking was seen as a much more signifi cant threat to individual morals and social well-being.
