The importance of clearly communicating the essence of harm reduction
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International Journal of Drug Policy 12 (2001) 35 – 36 Response The importance of clearly communicating the essence of harm reduction Neil Hunt * Kent Institute of Medicine and Health Sciences, Research and De6elopment Centre, Uni6ersity of Kent at Canterbury, Kent CT27PD, UK www.elsevier.com/locate/drugpo Friedman et al., (2001) make the welcome general point that harm reductionists should seek and experiment with alliances involving other groups engaged in different, but associ- ated, forms of social struggle. This is impor- tant because to do so offers the potential for both improving the understanding of harm reduction principles and conducting joint ac- tions that can strengthen the harm reduction movement and make it, and others, more effective. To improve public understanding of harm reduction we need to become better at com- municating its principles – and considerable merits – and distinguishing it as a movement grounded in public health. This also implies being clearer about what harm reduction is not. We should be plain about the fact that it is not synonymous with drug law reform and drug user rights movements – even though these interests can coincide and some people (myself among them) have a commitment to each. Similarly, some activities, even impris- onment, are sometimes (mis)represented as being harm reduction when they are better understood as part of a prohibitionist agenda. When working with other groups we need to protect harm reduction from such erosions of its meaning. To this end, Lenton and Single (1998) have provided one of the clearest definitions of our core principles and helped clarify what can legitimately claim to be harm reduction. By better articulating what harm reduction is, we will make it easier for others to understand where our interests coincide and how joint action can be undertaken. This particularly implies a re- sponsibility for the harm reduction move- ment (through the International Harm Reduction Association) to better define and disseminate information about its principles: work that is already in hand. The analysis provided by Friedman et al., 2001 underline the argument for us to draw attention to the links between poverty, social exclusion and drug-related harm. I believe it is vital for our shared definition of harm reduction explicitly to acknowledge this relationship and the * Tel.: +44-1227-824090; fax: +44-1277-824054. E-mail address: [email protected] (N. Hunt). 0955-3959/01/$ - see front matter © 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. PII:S0955-3959(01)00068-8
Transcript of The importance of clearly communicating the essence of harm reduction
International Journal of Drug Policy 12 (2001) 35–36
Response
The importance of clearly communicating the essence ofharm reduction
Neil Hunt *Kent Institute of Medicine and Health Sciences, Research and De6elopment Centre, Uni6ersity of Kent at Canterbury,
Kent CT2 7PD, UK
www.elsevier.com/locate/drugpo
Friedman et al., (2001) make the welcomegeneral point that harm reductionists shouldseek and experiment with alliances involvingother groups engaged in different, but associ-ated, forms of social struggle. This is impor-tant because to do so offers the potential forboth improving the understanding of harmreduction principles and conducting joint ac-tions that can strengthen the harm reductionmovement and make it, and others, moreeffective.
To improve public understanding of harmreduction we need to become better at com-municating its principles – and considerablemerits – and distinguishing it as a movementgrounded in public health. This also impliesbeing clearer about what harm reduction isnot. We should be plain about the fact that itis not synonymous with drug law reform anddrug user rights movements – even thoughthese interests can coincide and some people(myself among them) have a commitment toeach. Similarly, some activities, even impris-
onment, are sometimes (mis)represented asbeing harm reduction when they are betterunderstood as part of a prohibitionistagenda. When working with other groups weneed to protect harm reduction from sucherosions of its meaning. To this end, Lentonand Single (1998) have provided one of theclearest definitions of our core principles andhelped clarify what can legitimately claim tobe harm reduction. By better articulatingwhat harm reduction is, we will make iteasier for others to understand where ourinterests coincide and how joint action can beundertaken. This particularly implies a re-sponsibility for the harm reduction move-ment (through the International HarmReduction Association) to better define anddisseminate information about its principles:work that is already in hand. The analysisprovided by Friedman et al., 2001 underlinethe argument for us to draw attention to thelinks between poverty, social exclusion anddrug-related harm. I believe it is vital for ourshared definition of harm reduction explicitlyto acknowledge this relationship and the
* Tel.: +44-1227-824090; fax: +44-1277-824054.E-mail address: [email protected] (N. Hunt).
0955-3959/01/$ - see front matter © 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0955 -3959 (01 )00068 -8
N. Hunt / International Journal of Drug Policy 12 (2001) 35–3636
broad, social basis of much drug-related harm.By doing so, we enhance our ability to workalongside the different groups concerned withthese self-same interests.
Although we may wish that more examplesexisted, it is heartening to see the ground-breaking work of groups such as HOT/Re-spect, IDUUT and family groups in Australiabeing celebrated. These important beginningsprovide evidence that such approaches canwork, and models for others to emulate andbuild on. This paper does a valuable job in co-llating these examples and enabling us to thinkmore clearly about what else may be possible.
From my own ‘local’ perspective, I think animplication is that the narrow, drug problem-focus of many British needle exchange andmethadone schemes should be shifted andmore clearly positioned as essential partners inthe efforts to reduce poverty and social exclu-sion. Not only would this better serve the widerneeds of drug users – a primary objective – butit would also produce the useful, secondarybenefit of helping defend services against anincreasingly hostile British government bydemonstrating how such services are necessaryto New Labour’s declared aim of reducingsocial exclusion.
The authors argue that ‘‘the class war isbecoming two-sided again’’ in a way thatsuggests a return to previous patterns of confl-ict between labour and capital. Whilst I agreethat there are signs of a renaissance in thisstruggle, its character seems to be fundamen-tally different as it now occurs within amarkedly more globalised context; a point thatis implicit throughout the paper.
More than any period before, the 1990s wasthe decade of the brands. Today, the urbanpoor in the industrialised world – those mostaffected by drug-related harm – are sold self-esteem and identity through the likes of $150Nike trainers and Tommy Hilfiger clothing:goods they can ill afford that are marketed
through sophisticated, cynical and aggressiveglobal campaigns. These branded goods areproduced by multinational corporations thathave exported jobs from industrialised coun-tries to the developing world. There, ‘exportprocessing zones’ provide appalling labour con-ditions and work that rarely contributes to anyenduring improvement in the economic lot ofthe majority of third world workers. Describ-ing these processes Klein (2000, p. 370) acknow-ledges the place of drugs within this nexus and,in this way, indicates that anti-globalisationorganisations are potentially valuable allieswho may be sympathetic to our public health-based movement. Simultaneously, she makes itabundantly evident how, by participating inanti-globalisation activity, harm reductionistswould be involved in an extension of harmreduction work that engages with some of theroots of the poverty that underpin the worstmanifestations of drug-related harm.
This paper has helped me reflect on what theessence of harm reduction means to me – asa movement with a fundamental concernabout poverty and the processes that produceand maintain it; to better appreciate our needto communicate and defend our central tenetsand; it has stimulated my thinking about wayswe can work with other groups at local,national and global levels. For these reasons,I see it as a valuable and practical contributionto our work and one that I hope will lead toother activity which we will, in time, trace backto this broadening of the understanding ofwhat harm reduction means.
References
Friedman SR, Southwell M, Bueno R, Paone D, ByrneJ, Crofts N. Harm reduction – a historical viewfrom the left. International Journal on Drugs Policy2001;12(1):3–14.
Klein N. No logo. London: Flamingo, 2000.Lenton S, Single E. The definition of harm reduction.
Drug and Alcohol Review 1998;17(2):213–20.
