Global Drug Policy, Human Rights and Public Security: Perspectives from Latin America

This event will be co-hosted by the UCL Global Governance Institute, UCL Institute of the Americas, UCL Institute of Advanced Studies and Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales. The event is open to all, but to avoid disappointment, please register here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/global-drug-policy-human-rights-and-public-security-perspectives-from-latin-america-tickets-25836860746

Featuring two leading experts on drug and security policies in Latin America, this panel discussion will assess the current state of global drug policies by taking stock of the outcomes of the April 2016 United Nations General Assembly on the World Drug Problem (UNGASS) conference, and by examining the impact of drug policies on societies in Latin America. 

The region of the Americas has emerged as a central battle ground for contemporary efforts to contest and reform global drug policy. Latin American governments and social organisations have been at the forefront of efforts to reshape international debates concerning drug policy. The growing questioning of the drug policy status quo resonates widely in the Americas, which has suffered disproportionally the harmful effects of the production, trafficking, and - increasingly - consumption of drugs. For the region of Latin America, in particular, the prevailing response to drug trafficking has been increasing militarisation, which in turn has led to spiralling levels of violence in many societies.

Chair:
Dr Tom Pegram, Deputy Director of GGI

Speakers:
Monica Serrano (Colmex)
Julia Buxton (Central European University)

Mónica Serrano is Professor of International Relations at El Colegio de México, Senior Research Associate at the Centre for International Studies, Oxford University and a Senior Fellow at the Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies, CUNY. Between 2008 and 2011 she was Executive Director of the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect at the Graduate Centre, CUNY. In that capacity she worked closely with the UN and other human rights organizations to build momentum behind an emerging international norm to prevent mass atrocities. She is a member of the International Advisory Board of the FRAME Project “Fostering Human Rights Among European (External and Internal) Policies” hosted at the Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies.
She has written extensively on international security, and the international relations of Latin America, with particular reference to international institutions, security, human rights, transnational crime and civil-military relations.

Julia is Professor of Comparative Politics and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Programs at the School of Public Policy, Central European University, Budapest. She is a specialist on Latin America and the region’s evolving political, economic and security architecture. She is an expert on Venezuela, receiving her PhD from the London School of Economics, where she also studied for her MA (Distinction) in Comparative Politics. Outside of her geographic specialism, Julia has thematic expertise on democratisation and transition processes, post conflict recovery (SSR: Security Sector Reform; DDR: Demobilisation, Disarmament and Reintegration) and conflict analysis, including conflict sensitive design and policy implementation, as well as gender and gender sensitive design. A published expert on the drug trade, Julia has a particular interest in the impact of narcotic drugs and counter narcotics policies on development, peace building, poverty and human rights.