Rethinking Illicit Economies in Opium and Cocaine: Policy Responses to Drug Crops in the Global South

This book investigates the cross-border trade in illicit drug crops in the global south. It exposes an important paradox: despite all the dangers and negative consequences of these criminal networks, in many cases, they also provide marginalised and excluded communities with important private sources of protection, investment, and employment.

This book reconstructs and compares socioeconomic contexts, criminal careers, and changes in farmgate prices of illicit coca and opium poppy crops in A...