Prohibition, social groups "at risk" and institutional authoritarianism: social censorship towards “micro drug-dealers”

Abstract

The penalization of the “micro drug dealer” in chilean law causes an increase of institutional violence, at symbolical and material level, against marginal sectors of the population. ¿Which topics -“common places”- give ground to this legislative change? The concepts of “drug” and “drug-addict” themselves lie within the “rhetorical prohibicionist sphere” closed between the political horizons of criminalization and/or medicalization. So, in this article, the author argues about the necessity of openning the “rhetorical prohibicionist sphere” in order to develop a socio-juridical culture of drugs based on the depenalization and legalization of its use.