International Journal on Criminology Volume 6, Number 2, Winter 2018/Spring 2019 | 页面 20

The Legalization of Cannabis in the United States and Uruguay: Initial Findings
and civil society actors—of the cannabis regulation processes underway in Uruguay,
Colorado, and Washington State. Cannalex also aimed to measure the initial
consequences of the reforms in terms of politics, economics, health, and crime.
Given the newness and the changing character of the policies implemented by
these three states, the conclusions drawn from this study can only be provisional. 3
The Political Factors behind Legalization
The processes that led to the introduction of these new regulatory policies for
“recreational” cannabis vary greatly. In Uruguay, the regulation came from
above (deputies, government) and was based on a political call for a necessary
“modernization” of society along with changes in values (abortion, samesex
marriage), with the majority of the public in opposition. On the contrary, in
the two American states studied, the change in the legal status of cannabis came
through direct democracy (via a referendum proposed by popular initiative), after
intense mobilization of one part of civil society through sustained lobbying and
campaigns, which benefitted from significant financial support (from George Soros’s
Open Society Foundations).
Moreover, this legalization of recreational supply and demand took place in
a context where access to cannabis for medicinal purposes had already been authorized.
These very distinct processes still have some limitations. In Uruguay, the
lack of consensus on the part of the general public and the political classes has resulted
in the implementation of the reform facing multiple forms of resistance, in
particular among the healthcare and education professions. Conversely, in the two
American states, and especially in Colorado, local governments were overidden by
the will of the people and had trouble establishing “responsible” regulation since
they lacked a model that had already been tried and tested elsewhere in the world.
Two “Models” of Cannabis Regulation: Colorado vs. USA
The processes of transforming the legal status of cannabis were therefore
different in the two US states and in Uruguay, and expectations about legalization
were no less divergent. Whereas Uruguay legalized recreational
cannabis in the name of protecting the population from illicit markets that were
the source of violence, the two US states emphasized not only civil liberties but
also the potential tax revenues that would help finance education and prevention
programs. Finally, the way in which the regulations are actually implemented reveals
profound differences. 4 In Uruguay, the government plays a central role in the
3 See the final report: Une analyse comparée des expériences de régulation du cannabis (Colorado,
État de Washington, Uruguay) (INHESJ and OFDT, 2017). Available at: https://www.ofdt.fr/BDD/
publications/docs/CannalexRFS.pdf.
4 Michel Gandilhon, Ivana Obradovic, Nacer Lalam, Déborah Alimi, and David Weinberger, “Col-
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