Urban drug markets and zones of impunity in Colombia

In this publication, written by Isaac De León Beltrán and Juan Carlos Garzón, the Transnational Institute (TNI) explores the assumptions and the facts behind the retail drug trade and the responses to it.

These are some of the conclusions:

• The demolition of the zones of impunity has an immediate impact on the retail drug trade, but this is not sustainable unless the presence of the state is re-established and communities are reintegrated into the legal sphere.
• Interventions by the police are not sustainable in the long term because of the large number of officers that need to be sent into a zone of impunity. The state’s interventions will only displace the activities temporarily, allowing the illegal order to continue to perform its function of organising society, to the detriment of citizens’ security and quality of life.
• In order to build and restore the culture of legality in these areas, the conditions needed to incorporate these territories into the city must be put in place. This includes developing alternatives for the weakest links in the chain and bringing legal action against the criminal organisations that have the capacity to create zones of impunity.

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