Ethan Nadelmann

Ethan Nadelmann

Founder and Executive Director, Drug Policy Alliance

Ethan Nadelmann is the founder and executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, a New York City-based non-profit organization working to end the War on Drugs.

Nadelmann was born in New York City and received his BA, JD, and PhD from Harvard, and a master’s degree in international relations from the London School of Economics. He then taught politics and public affairs at Princeton University from 1987 to 1994, where his speaking and writings on drug policy—in publications ranging from Science and Foreign Affairs to American Heritage and National Review—attracted international attention. He authored Cops Across Borders, the first scholarly study of the internationalization of U.S. criminal law enforcement, and co-authored another book entitled Policing the Globe: Criminalization and Crime Control in International Relations, published by Oxford University Press in 2006.

In 1994, Nadelmann founded the Lindesmith Center, a drug policy institute created with the philanthropic support of George Soros. In 2000, the growing Center merged with another organization to form the Drug Policy Alliance, which advocates for drug policies grounded in science, compassion, health and human rights. Described by Rolling Stone as “the point man” for drug policy reform efforts, Ethan Nadelmann is widely regarded as the most prominent proponent of drug policy reform.

You can connect with Ethan Nadelmann and the Drug Policy Alliance here:

www.drugpolicy.org
www.twitter.com/ethannadelmann
www.facebook.com/ethannadelmann
www.twitter.com/drugpolicynews
www.facebook.com/drugpolicy

5 min
Inevitably drug laws will be disproportionately enforced against the poor, younger and darker-skinned members of society.
We’re no closer to solving this problem than we were 20 or 30 years ago.
Going to college in the mid 70s I started to smoke marijuana occasionally and wondered why people were getting arrested.  Why did I have to worry about getting arrested for this sort of thing?
Why have drug laws been disproportionately enforced against the poor and younger and darker-skinned members of society?
There is widespread acknowledgement that persisting in doing what we’re doing right now cannot work.
5 min
With the victories for the marijuana legalization initiatives in Colorado and Washington on Election Day 2012, it really presents the White House and the Attorney General with a dilemma.