While there have always been norms and customs around the use of drugs, explicit public policies, regulations, taxes, and prohibitions, designed to control drug abuse are a more recent phenomenon. Those policies sometimes have terrible side effects: most prominently the development of criminal enterprises dealing in forbidden (or untaxed) drugs and the use of the profits of drug dealing to finance insurgency and terrorism. Neither a drug free world nor a world of free drugs seems to be on offer, leaving citizens and officials to face the age old problem: What are we going to do about drugs? In this work, three noted authorities survey the subject with clarity, in this addition to the series, What Everyone Needs to Know. They begin by, defining "drugs," examining how they work in the brain, discussing the nature of addiction, and exploring the damage they do to users. The book moves on to policy, answering questions about legalization, the role of criminal prohibitions, and the relative legal tolerance for alcohol and tobacco. The authors then dissect the illicit trade, from street dealers to the flow of money to the effect of catching kingpins, and show the precise nature of the relationship between drugs and crime. They examine treatment, both its effectiveness and the role of public policy, and discuss the beneficial effects of some abusable substances. Finally they move outward to look at the role of drugs in our foreign policy, their relationship to terrorism, and the ugly politics that surround the issue.

Why is "drug" the name of a problem? -- Why have drug laws? -- How does drug-law enforcement work? -- What prevents drug abuse? -- What treats drug abuse? -- How much crime is drug-related? -- What are the benefits of drug use? -- Can drug problems be dealt with at the source? -- Does international drug dealing support terrorism? -- When it comes to drugs, why can't we think calmly and play nice? -- What is to be done? -- How do drugs work in the brain?.