“It's professional but it's personal”: Participation, personal connection, and sustained disagreement in drug policy reform

Original research
by
McLauchlan, Laura et al

Release Date

2022

Geography

Australia

Language of Resource

English

Full Text Available

No

Open Access / OK to Reproduce

No

Peer Reviewed

Yes

Objective

Drawing on qualitative interviews and ethnographic fieldwork with actors engaged in an Australian illicit drug policy reform campaign, this paper examines how particular modes of personal connection mattered in establishing and maintaining working relationships between a range of differently situated actors.

Findings/Key points

Arguing that personal connection is already an element of both inclusion and exclusion in drug policy creation, we suggest that policy actors interested in contributing to a more diverse and rigorous policy participation space attend to how people connect, with whom, and with what space for disagreement, while also taking seriously the labour of such connection across difference.

Keywords

Policy/Regulatory
Advocacy
Equity