Vulnerability and Police Contact: Gendered Pathways to Drug Dependence

该项目将力求形成对男女依赖途径的理解，了解这些经历中的具体性别差异，以及警务经验在这些途径中的地位。通过对毒品依赖者的生活经历和轨迹的调查，我将探讨性别如何影响这些轨迹的差异，包括以下几个方面：对伤害和脆弱性的理解；警察接触的历史影响；个人和社会环境如何导致更严重的依赖。通过这样做，这项研究将扩大对毒品依赖者的警察和国家干预如何使更多形式的危害永久化的知识。这项研究的中心将是放大参与者的声音。吸毒成瘾者往往受到主流社会的污名和排斥。我热衷于参与共同生产的方法论，因为我对它们改变权力动态的能力充满热情。利用对目前正在接受药物治疗的人和脱离工作的人进行的深入的生活史访谈，将为参与这项研究的参与者提供传记故事讲述机构。我建议通过女权主义废奴主义女权主义的观点来进行这项研究。在这种情况下，废奴主义者的观点将重新审视毒品依赖者生命过程中的伤害、脆弱性和国家干预的概念。这将探讨针对药物依赖的刑事司法对策如何适得其反地减轻个人和社会层面的伤害。在结束监禁国家和维持治安的背景下提出这一点，并了解它们通过制定毒品政策和治疗药物依赖者在维持暴力和伤害方面的关键作用，将寻求探索通过重新分配和整体做法减轻伤害和更充分地支持弱势群体的方法。这项研究将强调性别、吸毒和警务问题是相互关联的，为了解决伤害的根本原因，需要以这种方式处理这些问题。通过女权主义废奴主义的视角来探讨药物依赖的性别途径中的脆弱性的概念，将抵制针对药物使用的刑事司法方法，同时探索针对药物相关耻辱和歧视的性别专家创伤、知情的整体护理系统。它将提供一个批判性的视角，不仅考虑个人生活经历的具体性别差异，而且考虑刑事司法干预的相互作用和影响。女权主义废奴主义是交叉的，它不仅承认性别对人们生活体验的影响，而且承认种族、阶级和残疾也都对体验产生了物质影响。我会包括一个考虑到这些社会结构的横断面分析。我在这项研究中预见到的最突出的挑战涉及到与潜在的社会弱势成员进行研究的伦理问题。这里的主要考虑之一将是确保为参与这一研究项目的参与者提供支持。这将需要是最重要的，并在进行任何初步研究之前到位。确保研究包括联合制作的方法对于证明这项研究的目的是至关重要的。

This project would seek to form an understanding of pathways into dependence for women and men, the specific gendered differences in these experiences, as well as the place of policing experiences within these pathways. Through an investigation into the life experiences and trajectories of drug dependent men and women, I will explore how gender impacts differences in these trajectories by examining the following: understandings of harm and vulnerability; the historical influence of policing contacts and how personal and social circumstances can lead to more severe dependency. In doing so, this research will expand knowledge about how policing and state intervention for those with drug dependency can perpetuate further forms of harm.Central to this research will be the amplification of participant voices. Dependent drug users are often stigmatised and ostracised from mainstream society. I am keen to engage in co-productive methodologies, as I am passionate about their capability to shift power dynamics. Utilising in-depth, life-history interviews with those both currently in drug treatment and the disengaged will give biographical story-telling agency to participants involved in this research.I propose to conduct this research through a feminist abolitionist feminist perspective. An abolitionist perspective in this instance would readdress notions of harm, vulnerability and state intervention within the life courses of drug dependent individuals. This will explore the ways in which criminal justice responses to drug dependency are counterproductive to alleviating harm on individual and societal levels. Proposing this within the context of ending the carceral state and policing, and with an understanding of their key roles in perpetuating violence and harm through the enactment of drug policy and treatment of drug dependent users, will seek to explore ways of mitigating harm and supporting vulnerable people more fully through redistributive and holistic practices.This research would highlight that the issues of gender, drug use and policing are interconnected, and that in order to address the root causes of harm, they would need to be approached in such a way. Approaching notions of vulnerability within gendered pathways to drug dependence through a feminist abolitionist lens will resist criminal justice approaches to drug use whilst exploring gender-specialist trauma informed holistic systems of care for drug-related stigma and discrimination. It would provide a critical lens to consider the specific gendered differences not only of individual life experiences, but of the interactions and implications of criminal justice intervention. Feminism abolitionism is intersectional, acknowledging not only the impact of gender on peoples lived experiences, but that race, class and disability also all have material impacts on experiences. I would include an intersectional analysis taking these social structures into account.The most salient challenge I envisage within this study relates to ethical concerns around engaging in research with potentially vulnerable members of society. One of the main considerations here will be ensuring there is support available for participants who are engaging with this research project. This will need to be of the highest importance and put into place before any primary research is conducted. Ensuring that the research includes methods of co-production is essential in justifying the purpose of this research.