In the Americas of the late 1990s, many drugs, each in one of the six stages of its unique developmental cycle of use, are vying to succeed to the first place which cocaine had in the 1980s. The main illegal contenders, however, are marijuana and heroin. In this period, drug markets have converged: distributors sell more than one drug, and their clientele comprises many polydrug users. Eventually one may soar in popularity while the others decline. Drug markets diverge thereafter while its appeal lasts, and consumers will buy it exclusively. Thus, periods of convergence are critical: social, cultural, political and economic agencies are then operating among distributors and users which will promote one drug rather than another to prominence. Using ethnographic methods and an international, comparative approach, this 5-year project will isolate and describe these agencies in three settings in which they are variables, while the drugs and biological actors remain constant. The research will reconstruct the developmental cycles of the three drugs and the interconnections between them in the experiences of at least 250 Caribbean-African drug distributors and consumers in Brooklyn, New York (USA), Trinidad and Tobago (former British West Indies), and Martinique (French West Indies). By demonstrating how the contrastive social, cultural, economic and political factors in the three study sites are shaping differential outcomes for drug distributions and consumers in this current period of convergence, the investigators will enhance the serviceableness of ethnography in drug forecasting.
