6. Changing Times
Vice regulation demonstrates tremendous variation over time and place, with specific vices sometimes banned, and at other times made widely available and all-but-lauded. Some of the recent trends will be outlined here.
(1) Tobacco The regulatory approach to tobacco, and particularly towards cigarettes, has become much stricter in recent decades. Higher taxes and diminished availability of vending machine outlets are two notable changes, but perhaps most telling is the severe reduction in legal places to smoke in public. A trend that started with bans on smoking in airplanes and hospitals, has, in much of the world, spread to most workplaces, restaurants, and even pubs.
(2) Marijuana Marijuana has been globally prohibited (and covered by the UN conventions on drugs that promote global prohibition) for many decades now, but the once near-consensus that a ban (usually extended to possession as well as purchase, sale, manufacture, and transport) is desirable has shown significant cracks. Initial forays have included the legalization of marijuana for medical purposes, a change that has occurred in 20 US states and the District of Columbia. (Marijuana, medial or otherwise, remains prohibited at the federal level in the United States.) Uruguay has legalized marijuana, as have two US states, Colorado and Washington. Many countries and US states have adopted decriminalization or depenalization reforms that generally preclude any sort of serious punishment for marijuana users, though sellers might still be arrested and receive significant jail time.
(3) War on Drugs Marijuana is one of the more benign of the currently illegal drugs, and also the most popular. These factors, perhaps combined with pot’s obvious ability to offer relief to some patients in medical distress, help to explain why marijuana is the drug for which global prohibition is proving least sustainable. Nonetheless, the entire edifice of a prohibitory stance towards recreational drugs also has begun to crumble, probably due to the horrific consequences of the war on drugs. Portugal, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, and some other countries have adopted fairly broad depenalization plans for personal use, and addiction is treated in many countries as a health problem, not a criminal justice concern. Still, much of the world, including Malaysia, Singapore, China, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Iran, among other nations, enforces draconian penalties against those deemed to be in the illicit drug trade.
(4) Gambling The last half century has witnessed a significant liberalization of gambling regulations in much of the world. Since 1960, the number of US states hosting legal casinos has gone from one to more than 30, and the number of states offering lotteries has climbed from zero to more than 40. Asia recently has become a global casino powerhouse: gambling revenues in Macau are much higher than in any other casino locale, while Singapore’s two casinos have combined revenues from gambling about the same as the overall take from the scores of casinos in Las Vegas.
(5) Prostitution While tobacco has become more tightly regulated in recent decades, the trend in marijuana and other drugs, and in gambling, has been towards liberalization. Prostitution is harder to characterize on a leniency scale, as the world has been splitting between opposite approaches, one that accepts some forms of legal, regulated prostitution, and another that shifts the focus on the traditional ban from prostitutes to their customers. In much of the world, prostitution is illegal, though in some places where it is criminalized – including Thailand – it is tolerated, while in other locales it is severely punished. In Britain and Canada, prostitution per se is legal, though related activities, such a streetwalking or keeping a brothel, are illegal. Brothel prostitution is legal in many countries, including Germany and Switzerland, as well as in some Australian states. New Zealand has perhaps the most liberal rules governing prostitution: consensual agreements between adults for paid sex are legal, as are related activities, including streetwalking. A policy of one-sided enforcement, where sellers are not breaking the law but buyers are, was instituted in Sweden in 1999, and has served as a model for later reforms in Iceland and Norway, and continues to be considered elsewhere. In a sense, the Swedish system reverses the de facto system existing in many nations with prostitution bans, where prostitutes are criminalized but their customers are tolerated or punished less severely.
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