Introduction Drug Mules: International Advances in Research and Policy
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/hojo.12226 |
| Author | JENNIFER FLEETWOOD |
| Date | 01 September 2017 |
| Published date | 01 September 2017 |
The Howard Journal Vol56 No 3. September 2017 DOI: 10.1111/hojo.12226
ISSN 2059-1098, pp. 279–287
Introduction
Drug Mules: International Advances
in Research and Policy
JENNIFER FLEETWOOD
Lecturer in Criminology, Goldsmiths, University of London
Drug mules are a relatively recent phenomenon. Although they ap-
pear in fictional works such as drug trafficker Robert Sabbag’s (1976)
autobiography Snowblind, and in reports of the International Narcotics
Control Board at the United Nations in 1988 (Fleetwood and Haas 2011),
academic research came a little later. In 1986, Venezuelan criminologist,
Rosa del Olmo, was the first to note the involvement of women in the drug
trade (sometimes they were merely present during a drug seizure but
were punished, nonetheless) (Del Olmo 1986). In the UK, Penny Green
pioneered research on the topic in Drug Couriers, published as a short
volume by the Howard League in 1991. In it, she documented the fourfold
rise in the number of sentences for drug importation between 1979 and
1989 (Green 1991, p.17), and offered a careful examination of motivations
for involvement in trafficking, as well as the experiences of couriers in the
English and Welsh criminal justice system (see also Green 1998). Given the
Howard League’s early recognition and support for research on the sub-
ject of drug mules, it is a pleasure to be introducing a special issue on the
subject.
As the diverse contributions in this special issue show, the topic of drug
mules opens up wider questions about gender, crime, and punishment
on a global scale. As a transnational, globalised form of crime it demands
engagement with scholarship beyond researchers’ own culture, academic
canon or discipline. This is not to say that the contributions to this special
issue have entirely avoided the problems of ‘northern’ social theory (Aas
2012; Connell 2007). Readers may correctly note the absence of voices
from important pockets of the Global South, especially Southeast Asia.
Latin America is especially well represented here because of its central role
in cocaine production. I am pleased to introduce several emerging authors,
most of whom have seldom published in English.
279
C
2017 The Howard League and John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK
To continue reading
Request your trial