Re:Destroying drug cartels, the mathematical way
by snitko on Sunday November 04, 2012 @11:04AM
(#4740067)
Your proposition ignores the demand part of the equation completely.
Re:Destroying drug cartels, the mathematical way
by dllthomas on Sunday November 04, 2012 @12:00PM
(#4740219)
I don't know about you, but I only do cocaine to help the poor Columbian farmers.
Re:Destroying drug cartels, the mathematical way
by mtgx on Sunday November 04, 2012 @10:58AM
(#4740050)
I don't think I remember the book where I read this, but it was something about a former chief of police of New York, I believe in the 90's, when criminality was very high, and instead of focusing on the "big crimes", he focused on the small ones, like stopping graffiti on the walls, people jumping the gate at the subway, and other small crimes like that.
The point was to dramatically reduce this "ecosystem" of criminality. I believe it's kind of like when people see garbage on the ground, it's much easier for them to throw their garbage on the ground, too, because "others are doing it". The same thing must be with small crimes and with the people joining the drug cartels.
I believe The District was inspired from this guy's work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_District
Re:Destroying drug cartels, the mathematical way
by ryanwaggoner on Sunday November 04, 2012 @11:31AM
(#4740132)
You're probably talking about the broken windows theory:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory#New_York_...
Re:Destroying drug cartels, the mathematical way
by iamben on Sunday November 04, 2012 @11:46AM
(#4740175)
Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point?
Re:Destroying drug cartels, the mathematical way
by protomyth on Sunday November 04, 2012 @12:41PM
(#4740326)
The Freakonomics book has a counter argument to Gladwell's conclusions. They point out that crime went down nationwide and in cities at the same rate as NYC without the NYPD policies. They also point out a connection to the legalization of abortion.
// I am reporting on a book not expressing my own opinion
There are tons of farmer in Colombia who can only survive by growing those drugs, but they would like, in most of the case, to be able to grow crop or bananas or whatever is legal.
However they can't because a mere economic reason, they won't get enough money to survive from traditional culture.
If we invested the money we are actually using to violently fight against the cartel to develop the infrastructure and the education in those country we all be better off; we would have way less drugs in our world and we would have launch a new economy (more market for American brands like apple, google, IBM)