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Description - Drug Use and Cultural Context by Ross Coomber

Throughout the 20th and into the 21st centuries, considerable research, policy and media attention has focused on drug use in Britain, wider Europe, the USA and other advanced 'western' societies such as Australia and Canada. However the place of drugs in other cultural contexts has received far less attention. Both academics and policy makers need to broaden their horizons and, in particular, any prospects for the development of a better informed international drug control policy must take a more comparative approach. Studies of drug use in differing contexts and among diverse groups can question many strongly held assumptions about both drugs and drug use. Extreme levels of intoxication with various hallucinogens, substances regularly condemned in the West as essentially harmful and divisive for society, are often utilised in other societies in ritual and religious fashion to in fact enhance cohesiveness and bolster traditional practice. Other forms of drug use, whilst not necessarily essential to the cohesiveness of the society in which they are used, can be shown to be a significant aspect of what constitutes the general fabric of the culture of particular groups or a broader s

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