When Oregon was getting ready to vote on whether to decriminalize all drugs in 2020, I was covering the story for Vox. During my interviews with the leaders of the decriminalization campaign, they often cited Portugal. It decriminalized all drugs in 2000. In the years after, Portugal’s drug-related problems declined.
But I found the comparison to be inexact. Even as Portugal ended prison time for drug possession, it created a unique system that pushed people to stop using drugs — sometimes with the continued threat of penalties, like the revocation of a person’s professional license. Oregon didn’t plan to enact similarly tough penalties, and advocates for decriminalization did not have a clear explanation for why their law would work as well as Portugal’s.
Our conversations left me wondering whether Oregon could repeat Portugal’s successes if the decriminalization initiative passed.
It did pass, with more than 58 percent of the vote. The results have not been good. Overdose deaths have spiked, and drug users have overrun public spaces in Portland, as Jordan Gale and Jan Hoffman reported for The Times this week.
“At four in the afternoon the streets can feel like dealer central,” said Jennifer Myrle, who runs a downtown coffee shop and wine bar with her brother. “At least 20 to 30 people in ski masks, hoodies and backpacks, usually on bikes and scooters. There’s no point calling the cops.” On her walk to work, Myrle often sees needles, shattered glass, human feces and people who are passed out.
In today’s newsletter, I’ll use Oregon’s disappointing experience to consider a larger lesson about drug policy.
Carrot, but no stick
Drug addiction is an illness, but it is different from many other illnesses in a crucial respect. Most people with diabetes or cancer wish they could make their diseases disappear. Addicts have a more complex relationship with their disease. People with addiction often do not want treatment. They frequently think they have a handle on their drug use. That attitude is at the root of many people’s addictions.
“You need to answer the question: Why would people stop using an incredibly rewarding drug if there is no real consequence at all?” said Keith Humphreys, a drug policy expert at Stanford University.
A crucial part of Portugal’s change in 2000 was its attempt to nudge people to stop using drugs. The country did not simply decriminalize the substances. It also set up new incentives for seeking help: People caught using drugs can be sent to a special commission that tries to get them into free treatment. If drug users do not cooperate or they show serious problems, the commission can impose penalties, such as barring people from taking some jobs or visiting certain locations. It is a carrot-and-stick approach.
Oregon does not have much of a stick. The state imposes a $100 fine for people caught using drugs, but people can easily avoid the fine. A single phone call participating in a health screening, with no commitment to actual treatment, can get it waived. Drug users often ignore the fines, without consequences. Some police officers, knowing the fines can be toothless, no longer issue them.
As a result, people continue to use drugs, without an incentive to seek help.
The implication here — that law enforcement matters for stopping addiction — might make some liberals uncomfortable. But the evidence strongly suggests that people with addiction often need a push to seek help. By ending the threat of arrest or prison time and not creating anything like Portugal’s commissions, Oregon was left without a push.
Portugal, as it happens, seems to have lost its own push. The government has invested less in its commissions and treatment options in recent years, and some police officers have stopped citing people for drug use. As The Washington Post reported, Portugal’s drug problems are now getting worse, although they are still at lower levels than those in the U.S. and in Europe overall.
Supporters of decriminalization argue that Oregon’s policy just needs time: The law set aside money to improve access to addiction treatment, and that money has only recently gone out. Decriminalization advocates also say the pandemic is partly to blame for rising drug use.
At the very least, though, Oregon’s policy change has not turned things around.
The U.S. has spent decades criminalizing drug use, increasing spending on prisons and police and disproportionately locking up Black, Hispanic and Native Americans. Many experts believe that approach remains deeply flawed. Oregon’s experience shows there are also downsides to going to the other extreme.
Related: Oregon’s experience should deter other states from trying decriminalization, the Times columnist Bret Stephens argued. Jacob Sullum of Reason magazine countered that critics of the change aren’t grappling with the immorality of the law it replaced.
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