Drugs, Alcohol and Medicine in Sweden

Abstract

This background chapter sets the scene for the ethnographic study of Swedish women who use drugs (Part II of this book). It reviews historical and contemporary research on, and cultural representations of, drugs, paying specific attention to class and gender. How drugs first came into use in the Western world is examined under the heading Drug Laws and Drug Culture, and from there how they spread and how different substances and preparations came to be regarded from a legal and moral perspective. Why is alcohol not obviously perceived as a drug, and what roles do class and gender play in the laws and moral positions related to intoxication? Drugs and Women focuses on the legal market for controlled medicines and its connection to women. Why do women use more medicines but fewer illicit drugs than men? This is related to how women’s drug use has been constructed historically, and how the effects of different substances can be related to gender and class. In 1968, the Narcotics Penalty Act came into force in Sweden, and from then onwards, certain drugs became more strictly regulated. The fourth section, Sweden’s Drug Problem from the 1960s Onwards, examines how this happened and explains that illness and social deviation have been two influential perspectives on how drug use is viewed, with roots extending far back in history. This is reflected in the remarkable gap between drug policy and drug research in Sweden since the 1980s, during which period repressive policies have been fiercely debated. The last section, Qualitative Research on People who Use Drugs, looks into studies based on fieldwork and interviews with people who use drugs, especially women. The majority of such studies, and drug research in general, focus on men and on socially marginalised people who use drugs. In this book, I argue that such a focus helps to shape the understanding of drugs and drug use in Sweden. When linked to marginalised people only, moral condemnation of drugs and drug use that builds on that research will be directed towards a specific group of people, rather than particular substances and their use.