The Impact of Cannabis Decriminalisation in Australia and the United States

Abstract

This paper summarises and compares the impacts of cannabis decriminalisation measures in two countries. In Australia, an expiation model of decriminalisation succeeded in avoiding the imposition of criminal convictions for many offenders, but substantial numbers of offenders received criminal convictions because of a general "net-widening" in cannabis offence detections, and the failure of many offenders to pay expiation fees and thus avoid criminal prosecution. Despite these problems, the expiation approach has been cost-effective, reducing enforcement costs without leading to increased cannabis use. In the United States, cannabis decriminalisation similarly reduced enforcement costs, with enforcement resources generally redirected toward trafficking and other illicit drugs. There were no increases in cannabis use or substantial problems that could be ascribed to decriminalisation. The implications for other countries are discussed, with particular attention to the importance of implementation issues, monitoring, and evaluation. Although decriminalisation has succeeded in reducing enforcement and other costs without increasing the problems associated with cannabis use, the same impacts would not necessarily result from the legalisation of cannabis or the decriminalisation of other illicit drugs.

Full text

Drug and Alcohol Services Council (DASC)
South Australia
The impact of cannabis
decriminalisation in Australia
and the United States
Eric Single
1
, Paul Christie
2
and Robert Ali
3
DASC Monograph No. 6
Research Series
1
Professor of Public Health Sciences, University of Toronto
Research Associate, Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse
2
Senior Research Officer, Drug and Alcohol Services Council
3
Director, Clinical Policy and Research, Drug and Alcohol Services Council
August 1999

2
© Drug and Alcohol Services Council 1999
Drug and Alcohol Services Council
161 Greenhill Road
Parkside
South Australia 5063
Australia
ISBN 0-7308-6046-9

iii
CONTENTS
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES iv
SECTION 1 INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND
1
1.1 Overview 1
1.2 Purpose 4
SECTION 2 CANNABIS POLICY IN AUSTRALIA AND THE UNITED STATES 5
SECTION 3 THE IMPACT OF DECRIMINALISATION IN AUSTRALIA
13
3.1 General
13
3.2 Impacts of patterns of cannabis use 15
3.3 Impacts on law enforcement and criminal justice systems
16
3.4 Knowledge, attitudes and other social impacts 17
3.5 Implementation issues and problems
19
SECTION 4 THE IMPACT OF DECRIMINALISATION IN THE UNITED STATES 22
4.1 General 22
4.2 Evaluations of decriminalisation measures in particular states
22
4.3 Controlled studies on the impact of decriminalisation 23
4.4 Impacts on public use and the health care system 25
4.5 Impacts on drug enforcement costs and priorities
26
SECTION 5 SUMMARY OF THE IMPACTS OF DECRIMINALISATION IN AUSTRALIA
AND THE UNITED STATES 28
SECTION 6 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 30
NOTES
35
REFERENCES
36

iv
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES
TABLE 1 T
rends in cannabis and other illict drug use in
Australia and the United States 10
TABLE 2
Recent trends in cannabis and other illict drug use
among adults in Australia and the United States 11
FIGURE 1
Trends in cannabis use and perceived risk of cannabis use
among U.S. population aged 12–17, 1985–1997 25

1
SECTION 1 INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND
1.1 Overview
In Australia, the United States and other countries, there is a continuing interest
in reform of cannabis control laws in order to reduce the high enforcement costs
and adverse individual consequences of the criminalisation of cannabis
possession for personal use. The major impetus for reform has been that the
prohibition of cannabis possession has entailed relatively high costs, both in
terms of enforcement resources and in terms of adverse individual
consequences. Each year large numbers of predominantly young citizens are
arrested and prosecuted for cannabis possession, many of whom would not
otherwise have criminal records, with little or no apparent effect on rates of
cannabis use or cannabis-related harm.
Precise estimates of the costs of enforcing cannabis possession laws are lacking
but there is evidence that these costs are significant. Drug enforcement has
been estimated to cost over AUD$ 404.2 million in Australia in 1992 (Collins and
Lapsley, 1996) and more than US$ 17.4 billion in the United States in the same
year (Harwood et al., 1998
1
). While these figures include the costs for enforcing
laws against drug trafficking and against the possession of illicit drugs other
than cannabis, it is likely that a substantial proportion of these total drug
enforcement costs are due to cannabis possession because such cases
constitute a high proportion of all drug charges in both countries.
In addition to the high costs of enforcement, the policy of cannabis prohibition
has entailed other social costs. These include the encroachment on individual
rights and freedoms in order to facilitate drug enforcement, the adverse effects
of a criminal record for the large numbers of convicted offenders, the impact of
the penalties (fines, imprisonment) on convicted offenders, and other adverse
social consequences on users such as negative impacts on employment and
family discord caused by an arrest for cannabis possession.
The presumed benefit of the criminalisation of cannabis possession is the
deterrence of cannabis use. There is, however, little evidence of a strong
deterrent effect. Substantial increases in marijuana use occurred in the 1960s

2
and 1970s despite the application of criminal penalties for cannabis possession
both in the U.S. (Shafer Commission, 1972; Brecher, 1975; Goode, 1993) and in
Australia (Donnelly and Hall, 1994). These trends in cannabis use do not
constitute conclusive evidence regarding the lack of a deterrent effect, as it is
not known whether rates of use might have increased even more if cannabis
possession had not been prohibited. Nonetheless, it is noteworthy that nonusers
rarely cite fear of legal consequences as a reason for their nonuse (Shafer
Commission, 1972; Lenton et al., 1999). Rather, the simple lack of interest or
fear of adverse health consequences are the most commonly given reasons for
abstention from cannabis use (Shafer Commission, 1972; LeDain, 1972). There
is no discernable trend in perceived availability of cannabis despite high levels
of drug enforcement in the U.S. (U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services, 1998b; Johnston et al., 1998a; Johnston et al., 1998b). Criminological
research on the deterrence of other forms of deviant behaviour indicates that
deterrence does not generally occur if the risk of detection and punishment is
low. This is clearly the case with cannabis use (Goode, 1993). In Canada, which
until the late 1980s had the highest per capita rates of arrest for cannabis
possession in the world, it was estimated that less than one per cent of users
and one tenth of one per cent of use incidents were detected by the police
(LeDain, 1972).
Thus, in both Australia and the United States, laws prohibiting cannabis
possession entail considerable enforcement and social costs, yet they appear to
have little impact on deterring cannabis use. In the 1970s 11 U.S. states enacted
“decriminalisation” laws which reduced the penalties of cannabis possession to a
fine only, and more recently, several jurisdictions in Australia have enacted
similar measures. In 1987, South Australia introduced a “civil penalty” approach
to minor cannabis offences (including personal use and cultivation), which
involves the issuing of expiation notices or “on-the-spot” fines to detected
offenders. In the 1990’s, the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern
Territory have followed with the introduction of similar expiation schemes. More
recently, Victoria trialed and subsequently implemented in 1998, a system of
formal cautions for minor cannabis offenders.

3
It should be noted that the term “deciminalisation” is something of a misnomer,
as cannabis possession is still sanctioned by criminal law in these jurisdictions.
With respect to cannabis possession, the term “decriminalisation” has generally
been used to describe laws which reduce penalties for small amounts for
personal use to penalties other than imprisonment. Even under these so-called
decriminalisation laws, the possession of cannabis is against the law, albeit
subject to a maximum penalty of a fine only. Therefore, in evaluating the impact
of such measures it is important to note that we are only dealing with the impact
of reducing penalties rather than the impact of eliminating penalties altogether.
The debate about cannabis law reform, and in particular, the decriminalisation of
personal use of cannabis, has revolved around a number of arguments for and
against reform. Some of these arguments are supported or refuted by empirical
evidence, to varying degrees, and others are arguments which appeal to certain
values without the need for empirical evidence. One of the key arguments for
decriminalisation of personal cannabis use is that the recording of a criminal
conviction for such offences is a penalty that is out of proportion to the nature of
the offence, and that a conviction could have negative social impacts upon
offenders who are otherwise law abiding. Related to this is the argument that the
criminal prosecution approach entails a greater encroachment upon individual
rights and freedoms in the name of drug law enforcement. It is further argued
that decriminalisation of cannabis use would serve to separate the cannabis
market from the market for other illicit drugs, and send a clear message that
cannabis is not regarded by authorities in the same way as illicit drugs such as
heroin and amphetamines. Finally, another common argument is that a
decriminalisation approach to cannabis use would free up substantial law
enforcement and criminal justice resources, and reduce associated costs to the
community (Christie, 1991).
Those who argue against cannabis decriminalisation believe that such an
approach conveys a message to society, and especially the young, that cannabis
is not viewed as a serious issue, and that it carries little risk, which may in turn
lead to increased levels of use in the community. Also, it is sometimes argued
that a more liberal approach to cannabis use may lead to greater use of other
illicit drugs (ie., the “gateway theory”). It is further argued that the principle licit

4
drugs, alcohol and tobacco, cause a substantial burden of illness and social
problems in our society, and that a more liberal approach to cannabis use may
result in more health problems arising from its use. In the case of the South
Australian expiation approach, opponents of its implementation argued that it
would make it easier for people to deal in small amounts of cannabis, with a
reduced risk of criminal prosecution. Further, police would find it difficult to
enforce a system of on-the-spot fines, and they would have their professional
image undermined (Christie, 1991).
Regardless of one’s position on these issues, it is clear that the policy debate,
both in the United States and Australia, has not been well informed by research,
and different legislative approaches have been introduced in different locations
at different times, with little or no planning for evaluating the impacts of the
changes, and monitoring them on an ongoing basis. Both sides of the debate
have presumed that certain impacts will result from changes in policy, with little
or no reference to empirical evidence.
1.2 Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to summarise and compare the impacts of cannabis
decriminalisation measures in Australia and the United States. In each setting,
evidence will be presented regarding the impact on rates and patterns of use
and indicators of cannabis-related harm, as well as the impacts on the criminal
justice system and to individual users. The paper will also discuss the extent to
which the impact of decriminalisation can be properly gauged in each setting,
including the extent to which data are available and the comprehensiveness of
the evidence. The discussion will conclude with the implications to drug policy
reform in other countries, including recommendations regarding the development
of similar measures in other jurisdictions based on the experience in Australia
and the United States.

5
SECTION 2 CANNABIS POLICY IN AUSTRALIA AND THE UNITED STATES
It should be noted at the outset that there are a number of potentially significant
similarities and differences between Australia and the United States in terms of
cannabis policy, as well as the underlying political and social environment in
which this policy operates. Australia and the United States are relatively large
countries, with climatic conditions that are favourable to cannabis cultivation in
large areas. Australia is relatively near to the opium producing regions of
Southeast Asia, while the U.S. is relatively close to the cocaine producing
regions of Colombia and other parts of South America. Both countries have well
developed and healthy economies.
Both countries have federal systems of government in which state governments
have the primary jurisdiction over laws governing the use or trafficking in illicit
drugs. In the United States, there are federal, state and sometimes even local
municipal statutes concerning illicit drugs. State law is generally applied in
cases of illicit drug possession, but federal law may be applied in particular
circumstances. Federal drug policy in the United States is generally developed
without the direct participation of the states. The Australian National Drug
Strategy is intended to be a national policy, rather than a strictly federal policy. It
is governed by a complex set of intergovernmental committees. At the top of this
structure is the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy which consists of health and
law enforcement ministers from each state or territory, along with their
counterparts in the federal government. The specific goals and performance
indicators for each phase of the National Drug Strategy have been developed
after an extensive consultation process (Commonwealth Department of Health,
Housing, Local Government and Community Services, 1993; Ministerial Council
on Drug Strategy, 1998). Although the Australian National Drug Strategy thus
involves the federal government working together with the state and territorial
governments, the individual states can and do take independent positions on
drug policy issues on occasion (Single and Rohl, 1997). Thus the coordination of
federal and state drug policy is an ongoing contentious issue in both countries.
While there are important differences in their general approach to drug issues,
discussed below, a key aspect of drug policy in both countries is the reliance on

6
criminal law to deter use. Even in those American and Australian states which
have “decriminalised” cannabis, possession is against the law and subject to
penalties. In both countries, the fundamental response to drug problems is to
expend considerable resources in supply interdiction and the enforcement of
laws against the possession of illicit drugs.
On the other hand, there are also dissimilarities between the two countries with
regard to the social and political environment in which cannabis policy operates.
Australia has a much smaller population and it is more geographically isolated.
Whereas Australia has no land border with any other country, the U.S. has long
borders with Mexico and Canada, rendering the control of drug trafficking more
difficult. The United States has a somewhat greater disparity between the
highest and lowest income levels, and sharper racial and ethnic divisions. While
aboriginal health is certainly a salient and ongoing issue in Australia, illicit drug
use is not viewed as a racial issue, as it sometimes portrayed in the U.S. (Musto,
1987). The social welfare system is more highly developed in Australia, and
there is universal health care.
There are also important differences in the basic approach to drug policy, the
manner in which drug policy is developed and the role played by different socio-
political groups on drug issues. In contrast to the U.S. “War on Drugs” policies,
the Australian National Drug Strategy has been characterised by two distinctive
features. First, whereas American drug policy focuses exclusively on illicit drugs,
the National Drug Strategy is a comprehensive approach, including not only illicit
drugs but licit drugs such as alcohol. Second, and more importantly for the
purposes of this discussion, the National Drug Strategy is based on the principle
of harm minimisation (Commonwealth Department of Health, Housing, Local
Government and Community Services, 1993). Priority is placed on reducing the
negative consequences of drug use rather than on necessarily eliminating drug
use or ensuring abstinence. Harm minimisation is not in conflict with abstinence-
oriented interventions, as harm reduction programmes are often the first step
towards abstinence (Lenton and Single, 1998). Nor does it necessarily imply
support for drug legalisation, as there are clearly ways of implementing harm
minimisation programmes while maintaining drug prohibition in the general
population.

7
American drug policy, on the other hand, explicitly rejects harm minimisation and
focuses on the total elimination of drug use. The basic approach to drug
prevention is “zero-tolerance.” In the words of the president of the American
Council for Drug Education:
“That means no drug use in the schools, none in the workplace,
none on the highways and none in the families. Sanctions need to
be swift, effective, and broadly supported by all segments of our
society.” (Dupont, 1984)
Senior police officials have publicly advocated capital punishment for drug
offences (see, eg, Beers, 1991: 38), and William Bennett, special Presidential
assistant on drugs (the so-called “drug czar”) at the time, even suggested on a
radio talk show that beheadings might be a solution to the drug problem:
“Legally, it might be difficult. But…somebody selling drugs to a kid?
Morally, I don’t have any problem with that at all.” (quoted in
Lazare, 1990).
While such rhetoric represents an extreme expression of the War on Drugs
mentality, it is indicative of the context in which cannabis decriminalisation
measures operate. Decriminalisation has not received support from federal
authorities in the U.S. and, as indicated above, it is generally opposed by law
enforcement agencies and non-government organisations concerned with drug
issues. In the context of the War on Drugs, any reduction in penalties for any
illicit drug is often seen as inconsistent with the generally punitive approach to
drug prevention.
In Australia, law enforcement has generally been more supportive towards harm
minimisation measures such as cannabis decriminalisation (Single and Rohl,
1997). Australian law enforcement officials are more likely than their American
counterparts to view harm minimisation in a favourable light as one means for
implementing a new role of law enforcement embodied in the concept of
“community policing”. Community policing focuses on working with health

8
professionals and community groups to deal with underlying problems. In
contrast, American law enforcement agencies tend to view their role in drug
enforcement more in terms of the traditional police role of apprehending
criminals (McDowell, 1992).
Similarly, non-government organisations concerned with drug issues are more
likely to support cannabis decriminalisation and other harm minimisation policies
in Australia (ADCA, 1993). Drug user groups, which receive financial support
from state governments and Commonwealth communicable disease prevention
programmes, are another source of pressure for drug policy reform in Australia.
Such user groups are virtually non-existent in the U.S. Indeed, the very same
events in the two countries often lead to exactly the opposite policy conclusions.
While the premature death of a drug dependent person in the U.S. is generally
seen as evidence favouring even more pronounced efforts to enforce strict
prohibition, the families of Australian drug users who have died as a result of
their drug use often draw the opposite conclusion and see the death of their
family member as evidence of the failure of prohibitionist policies and a strong
indicator that drug policy should be changed.
2
Thus, cannabis decriminalisation is more likely to be viewed as inconsistent with
general drug policy in the American context, but confluent with the general drug
strategy in the Australian context. However, the greater underlying support for
drug law reform in Australia should not be overstated. There are some non-
government organisations and law enforcement officials in Australia opposed to
any changes to prohibitionist policy, and there are significant groups in the
United States who are devoted to drug policy reform. However, on balance there
has been a great deal more overt public support for measures such as cannabis
decriminalisation in Australia than in the United States. Throughout the 1980s, a
series of Gallup Polls found that approximately three quarters of Americans
oppose the legalisation of marijuana (Inciardi and McBride, 1991). In contrast, a
1993 Australian survey showed that over half of the population indicated that
personal use, possession and cultivation of cannabis should be legal (Bowman
and Sanson-Fisher, 1994). The same study showed that around three quarters of
respondents believed that personal use, possession and cultivation should not
be regarded as criminal offences.

9
It is difficult to compare rates of cannabis use in Australia and in the United
States. National surveys in each country have been conducted at different times
and using differently worded questions on drug use. There are two series of
national surveys in the United States: a national household survey conducted by
the National Institute of Drug Abuse since 1972 (U. S. Department of Health and
Human Services, 1998a; 1998b), and ongoing surveys of youth and young adults
entitled Monitoring the Future (Johnston et al., 1998a; 1998b). In Australia, the
National Drug Strategy conducted national household surveys in 1985, 1988,
1991, 1993 and 1995 (Commonwealth Department of Health and Family
Services, 1996).
Australians are more likely to use cannabis, while Americans use other illicit
drugs more often. Table 1 presents the results of the national household surveys
regarding self-reported rates of cannabis use in the respondents’ lifetimes, in the
previous 12 months, in the prior month and in the past week. Rates of cannabis
use were approximately the same in both countries until the late 1980s, but in
the past decade cannabis use has become more common among Australians. In
the United States, the proportion of respondents reporting that they have ever
used marijuana has increased slowly since the late 1970s. Rates of current use
(use in the previous 12 months) declined in the U.S. from 14% in 1985 to 8% in
1992, and has remained relatively stable since then. Rates of monthly and
weekly use similarly declined in the U.S. from the mid-1980s to the early 1990s.
The 1996 and 1997 U.S. national surveys found small but statistically significant
increases in cannabis use, particularly among younger persons.

Table 1: Trends in Cannabis and Other Illicit Drug Use in Australia and the United States
1979 1982 1985 1988 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997
Ever used cannabis in lifetime
--Australia -- -- 28 28 32 34 34 -- 31 -- --
--United States 28 29 29 31 31 30 31 31 31 32 33
Use of cannabis in past 12 months
--Australia -- -- -- 12 12 -- 12 -- 13 -- --
--United States 17 16 14 10 9 8 9 9 8 9 9
Use of cannabis in past month
--Australia -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
--United States 13 12 10 6 5 5 5 5 5 5 5
Use of cannabis in past week
--Australia -- -- -- 5 5 -- 4 -- 5 -- --
--United States -- -- -- 5 3 -- 2 -- -- -- --
Sources:
Commonwealth Department of Health & Family Services. (1996). National Drug Strategy Household Survey: Survey Report 1995. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing
Service. Page 30.
Commonwealth Department of Human Services & Health. (1994). Statistics on Drug Abuse in Australia 1994. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. Table 5.1.
Donnelly, N. and Hall, W. (1994). Patterns of cannabis use in Australia. National Drug Strategy Monograph Series, No. 27. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. Table 7.
Makkai, T. and McAllister, I. (1997). Marijuana in Australia: patterns and attitudes. National Drug Strategy Monograph Series, No. 31. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing
Service. Figures 1.1 and 5.1.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (1998). Preliminary Results from the 1997 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse. Washington: Department of Health and Human
Services. Tables 3B, 4B and 5B.
10

11
Australia did not experience similar declines in rates of current and weekly
cannabis use. Thus, survey results from 1995, the most recent year in which
data are available from both countries, show higher rates of use in the prior year
(13% in Australia versus 8% in the U.S.). Furthermore, rates of weekly use are
higher among Australians in the two years in which comparable data are
available. Donnelly and Hall (1994) have noted that Australian cannabis users
are more likely than American users to report using at least once a week (11% in
Australia compared to 8% in the U.S.).
Table 2 presents selected findings from the young adult age group (ages 20-29)
in the U.S. Monitoring the Future surveys (Johnston et al., 1998b), in comparison
with a similar age group (ages 19-28) in the Australian national surveys. While
the age groupings are not exactly the same, it would appear that young
Australians are more likely than their American counterparts to use cannabis
(32.9% versus 26.5% in 1995). This corroborates the conclusion of Donnelly and
Hall (1994) regarding school-age adolescents in the two countries. They
compared the U.S. Monitoring the Future findings on secondary school students
to student surveys in New South Wales and Victoria and noted higher rates of
cannabis use in the Australian samples. On the other hand, it can also be seen
in Table 2 that young Americans are more likely than their Australian
counterparts to use other illicit drugs (13.8% versus 10.9%).
Table 2: Recent Trends in Cannabis and Other Illicit Drug Use Among Young Adults
in Australia and the United States
1988 1991 1993 1995
Use of cannabis in past 12 months
--Australia (aged 20-29) 27.9 29.7 32.3 32.9
--United States (aged 19-28) 31.8 23.8 25.1 26.5
Use of other illicit drug in past 12 months
--Australia (aged 20-29) 7.8 10.6 9.2 10.9
--United States (aged 19-28) 21.3 14.3 13.0 13.8
Sources:
Australia: National Drug Strategy Household Surveys, cited in Williams, Paul, (1997). Progress of
the National Drug Strategy: Key National Indicators. Publication Number 2116. Canberra:
Department of Health and Family Services. Tables 31 and 38.
United States: Johnson, L., O’Malley, P. and Bachman, J. (1997). Monitoring the Future, Volume
II: College and Young Adults. Washington: National Institutes of Health. Table 8.

12
In both countries the socio-demographic portrait of a cannabis user is that of a
young, unattached male. Rates of use are highest among single men in their late
teens or early twenties (Commonwealth Department of Health and Family
Services , 1996; U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1998b).
Marijuana use is highest among Blacks and lowest among Hispanics in the U.S.
(U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1998b). Unemployment is
related to higher rates of cannabis use and there are significant geographic
differences in rates of cannabis use in both countries. In the United States, rates
of cannabis use are relatively high in larger cities and in the Western states
(U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1998b). In Australia, rates of
use are highest in the Northern Territory (52% ever used and 21% used in past
12 months in 1995), Australian Capital Territory (42% and 16%, respectively)
and Western Australia (37% and 16%, respectively). Use is least common in
Queensland, where 26% report ever using cannabis and only 10% used in the
past year (Commonwealth Department of Health and Family Services, 1996).

13
SECTION 3 THE IMPACT OF DECRIMINALISATION IN AUSTRALIA
3.1 General
South Australia was the first Australian jurisdiction to implement an expiation
system for minor cannabis offences. This “prohibition with civil penalties” model
(McDonald et al, 1994) does not represent a complete decriminalisation of
personal cannabis use, as the possibility remains for offenders to receive
criminal convictions if they do not pay expiation fees on time. While similar
expiation systems have been introduced in the Australian Capital Territory and
the Northern Territory, this section will focus primarily on the South Australian
experience, as it has been the focus of a number of evaluation studies.
The South Australian Cannabis Expiation Notice (CEN) system began in 1987,
after a period of intense community and political debate in South Australia. The
government at that time had pushed strongly for a new approach to cannabis
possession, partly on the strength of the experience of certain US states which
had adopted a less punitive approach. The main arguments for an expiation
system were the potential cost savings that could be realised through this
different approach to minor cannabis offences, and the opportunity to lessen the
burden of negative social impacts upon substantial numbers of convicted minor
cannabis offenders. Implicit in this second view was the belief that the potential
harms of using cannabis were outweighed by the harms arising from criminal
conviction.
In addition to the normal arguments against decriminalisation, cited earlier, the
opponents of the CEN scheme raised other objections at the time of the
scheme’s introduction. They argued that South Australia would see problems
such as an increased risk to the public at large from motor vehicle drivers under
the influence of cannabis, and fewer problematic cannabis users being referred
by the courts for treatment. They also anticipated that wealthier segments of
society would find less disincentive to use cannabis than poorer segments, and
that offenders who failed to pay expiation fees on time might be difficult to track
down for subsequent prosecution. It was also argued that the CEN scheme
would discourage people from contesting matters in court, and provide more
opportunities for police corruption (Christie, 1991).

14
Under the South Australian Cannabis Expiation Notice (CEN) Scheme, persons
detected for a minor cannabis offence by police can be issued with an expiation
notice, or “on-the-spot” fine. The CEN can be cleared by payment of the
prescribed expiation fee within 30 or 60 days, depending on the amount of fines.
Failure to pay the fees within the payment period typically results in the
recording of a criminal conviction for a cannabis offence.
3
The expiation fees
range from $50 to $150, and apply to offences involving possession of up to 100
grams of cannabis or 20 grams of cannabis resin, possession of equipment for
consuming cannabis, or cultivating up to 10 cannabis plants.
The introduction of the CEN scheme in South Australia was not accompanied by
any planned evaluation or monitoring activities. A pre/post design evaluation
would have greatly assisted in the determination of short-term impacts of the
scheme, particularly if appropriate data monitoring systems could have been put
into place. The first study to examine the impacts of the CEN scheme focused on
the first nine months of operation of the scheme (Sarre et al, 1989), and looked
at the limited available data on patterns of offence detection, and at operational
aspects of the scheme. This was followed in 1991 by a post-hoc study of the
potential impacts of the CEN scheme on patterns of cannabis use in the South
Australian community, based on national drug survey data and on surveys of
schoolchildren’s drug use in various Australian jurisdictions (Christie, 1991). In
1994, the Australian Commonwealth government commissioned the National
Task Force on Cannabis to examine a range of issues relating to cannabis,
including health issues, public attitudes, legislative options, and patterns of use
in the community. This work included an update on the potential role of the CEN
scheme in changing patterns of cannabis use in the community (Donnelly, Hall &
Christie, 1995).
Following the work of the Task Force, the Commonwealth government
commissioned an in-depth study of the social impacts of various legislative
approaches to cannabis, particularly to personal use of cannabis. The first phase
of this work identified the legislative approaches in place in all Australian
jurisdictions, and examined what law enforcement and criminal justice data were
available. The second phase of this research was a detailed evaluation of the
impacts of the South Australian CEN scheme, including comparisons with a total
prohibition jurisdiction, Western Australia (Ali et al, 1999). This study involved a

15
range of methodologies, and examined areas including available law
enforcement and criminal justice data, personal experiences of minor cannabis
offenders, population rates of use, public perceptions of cannabis and the laws,
attitudes of employers to cannabis and cannabis offending, the economic costs
of the CEN scheme, and the knowledge, attitudes and practices of the law
enforcement and criminal justice sectors. While this has been the most thorough
evaluation of the expiation approach to cannabis use, the assessment of some
impacts was hampered by the lack of available data on minor cannabis offence
outcomes.
3.2 Impacts on patterns of cannabis use
The potential impact of the introduction of the expiation approach upon levels
and patterns of cannabis use in South Australia was the subject of much debate
at the time of introduction of the scheme in 1987. Since then, a number of post-
hoc analyses have been conducted, based on population survey data on drug
use prevalence, with each analysis adding more recent data to the picture (eg.
Christie, 1991; Donnelly, Hall & Christie, 1995; Donnelly, Hall & Christie, 1999).
None of these studies have found an increase in cannabis use in the South
Australian community which is attributable to the introduction of the Cannabis
Expiation Notice scheme.
Assigning any legislative change a causal role in changing rates of cannabis use
in the general population will always be difficult, given the many factors that
affect drug use, unless of course the observed changes are very dramatic, follow
the legislative change, and have occurred in the context of similar changes not
being observed in jurisdictions that have not changed legislative approach.
South Australia showed a change in the adjusted prevalence of ever having used
cannabis, from 26% in 1985 to 36% in 1995. This was a significant increase, but
similar increases were observed over the same period in jurisdictions with a total
prohibition approach to cannabis, such as Victoria and Tasmania. Similarly,
there was an Australia-wide increase in rates of weekly cannabis use over the
ten year period from 1985 to 1995, and South Australia did not differ from the
rest of Australia on this indicator (Donnelly, Hall & Christie, 1999). Thus, the
expiation approach cannot be said to have led to greater levels of cannabis use
in the South Australian community.

16
A detailed interview study of minor cannabis offenders in both South Australia
and Western Australia concluded that both the CEN scheme and the more
punitive prohibition approach had little deterrent effect upon cannabis users.
Offenders from both jurisdictions reported that an expiation notice or conviction
had little or no impact upon subsequent cannabis and other drug use. Most
subjects reported that even if they were caught again, they would not stop using
the drug (Ali et al, 1999). These findings support the view that more severe
penalties have little deterrent effect for cannabis users, and that the legislative
approach, whether prohibition or civil penalties, has little overall impact upon
levels and patterns of cannabis use in the population.
3.3 Impacts on law enforcement and criminal justice systems
One of the most obvious impacts of the CEN scheme in South Australia has
been the effect on rates of minor cannabis offence detection. The number of
offences for which cannabis expiation notices were issued increased from
around 6,000 in 1987/88 to approximately 17,000 in 1993/94 and subsequent
years (Christie, 1999). This phenomenon had been anticipated by Sarre et al.
(1989) in their evaluation of the first nine months of operation of the CEN
scheme. While not apparent at that time, they highlighted this “net-widening” as
a likely emerging issue, referring to an expected increase in the numbers of
minor cannabis offences formally dealt with under the expiation model. Net-
widening is not related to any change in the pattern of cannabis use, but reflects
the greater ease with which police can process minor cannabis offences, and a
shift away from the use of police discretion in giving offenders informal cautions,
to a process of formally recording all minor offences.
Since the inception of the CEN scheme, the rate of payment of expiation fees
has remained low, at around 50%. The reasons for the low rate are discussed
later. This low rate of expiation has meant that substantial numbers of minor
cannabis offenders who were given expiation notices subsequently received a
criminal conviction for a cannabis offence as a result of their failure to pay
expiation fees. While this might suggest that there has been an unintended
burden upon the court system in dealing with these expiation fee defaulters, in
practice, the problem had not been as severe as one might expect, as significant
numbers of those people who were issued with a summons to appear in court
chose the option of pleading guilty in writing, and not appearing in person. The

17
vast majority of those expiation matters dealt with by the courts resulted in
convictions for the offenders, with similar fines imposed to the original expiation
fees, and with the addition of court fees.
The most recent study of the social impacts of the CEN scheme included an
examination of the attitudes of law enforcement and criminal justice personnel
(Sutton & McMillan, 1999). There was very strong support for the CEN scheme,
and little support for a return to the former approach among those administering
and enforcing the system. Common reasons cited in support of the scheme were
its perceived cost-efficiency, its convenience for law enforcement officers, and
its capacity to lessen negative social impacts associated with conviction. The
main concern expressed by the law enforcement sector related to the work of the
Drug Task Force. Specialist drug law enforcement personnel felt that the limit of
up to ten cannabis plants in cultivation that could be dealt with via expiation was
too high, and had led to criminal groups exploiting the expiation scheme by
spreading commercial cultivation enterprises in separate plots of ten plants.
These law enforcement personnel argued strongly for a reduction in the expiable
number of plants to three or four.
The recent research into the social impacts of the CEN scheme also examined
the overall cost-effectiveness of the CEN scheme, by estimating the monetary
costs associated with the scheme (Brooks et al, 1999). This study estimated the
unit cost of issuing and processing an expiation notice, when paid on time, at
approximately $30 per case. The unit costs increased dramatically if the matter
progressed to court and other payment options were taken up. The total costs
associated with the CEN scheme in 1995/96 were estimated to be around $1.2
million (not including police time in detecting the offence). Total revenue from
fees and fines was estimated to be around $1.7 million. The cost-effectiveness
would obviously be greater if the rate of expiation could be increased. It was
also estimated that, had a prohibition approach been in place in South Australia
in the same year, the total cost would have been around $2 million, with revenue
from fines of around $1 million.
3.4 Knowledge, attitudes and other social impacts
Research commissioned by the Australian National Task Force on Cannabis
showed that in both South Australia and the Australian Capital Territory, the only

18
two jurisdictions at that time with an expiation approach to minor cannabis
offences, the general population were significantly more misinformed than in
other jurisdictions about the legal status of activities relating to personal
cannabis use (Bowman & Sanson-Fisher, 1994). For example, in 1993 34% of
South Australians respondents and 43% of those from the Australian Capital
Territory incorrectly believed that it was legal to possess cannabis for personal
use, compared with less than 10% of respondents from most other jurisdictions.
A more recent evaluation of the expiation scheme in South Australia showed that
little change in awareness has occurred: 24% of a 1997 sample thought that
possession of less than 100 grams of cannabis was legal, and 53% believed it
was legal to grow up to three cannabis plants for personal use. Furthermore,
only 40% of this sample knew that there was some legal consequence
associated with expiable cannabis offences (Heale, Hawks & Lenton, 1999).
Thus, the introduction of the CEN scheme, and the absence of any strategy to
inform the community of the implications of offending under the scheme, appears
to have given rise to misunderstanding regarding the legal status of personal
cannabis use, and of the possible outcomes for offenders.
It is difficult to gauge whether the CEN scheme has had any impact upon the
attitudes of the general population towards cannabis use. Given the poor
understanding of the scheme, it would seem unlikely that the scheme has
brought about significant change in community attitudes. The South Australian
community seems to be fairly tolerant of personal cannabis use, but not of
activities relating to commercial quantities of cannabis (Heale, Hawks & Lenton,
1999). Comparable trend data are not available, but South Australia does not
appear to be different from other jurisdictions in this respect.
Interviews with cannabis offenders who had been issued with expiation notices
showed a range of perceived impacts. A substantial proportion indicated that
dealing with the CEN caused them financial hardship, and a majority felt that the
fines were unreasonable. Respondents from Western Australia, a prohibition
state at the time of the study, were found to be more fearful and less trusting of
police compared with the South Australian sample after their offence detection.
In addition, Western Australian offenders were more likely than South Australian
offenders to report difficulties in obtaining or staying in employment following
their offence detection, and to report relationship and accommodation difficulties

19
stemming from their offence. Offenders from the two jurisdictions did not differ
with respect to their experience of overseas travel difficulties, their perceptions
of themselves as criminals, or their self-reported drug use after their offence
(Lenton et al, 1999).
3.5 Implementation issues and problems
As noted earlier, there have been an ongoing implementation problems
regarding the “net-widening” and the low rate of expiation (Sarre et al, 1989).
Most of those people who did not pay the expiation fees receiving a court-
imposed criminal conviction (Christie, 1999). Thus, an unintended consequence
of the CEN scheme has been that, rather than eliminate the prospect of criminal
convictions being received for minor cannabis offences, as many or perhaps
even greater numbers of individuals have received convictions through failure to
pay fees.
The reasons for the failure to pay expiation fees appear to be quite varied.
Financial hardship is one reason cited by offenders who failed to expiate their
cannabis offences (Humeniuk et al, 1999). Another reason is that a small
number of cannabis expiation notices are issued in the context of other charges
being laid, for which a court appearance is required anyway. For such
individuals, the expiable cannabis offence is perceived as a less serious matter,
and overlooked - indeed, the incentive to pay expiation fees and thereby avoid
conviction does not apply in these cases, as the person may well be facing
conviction for another matter. A further minor contributing factor to the low rate
of expiation is the proportion of cases where insufficient or false identifying
information is provided by offenders at the time of offence detection, resulting in
matters that cannot be prosecuted at a later time. While this undoubtedly occurs,
its extent is unclear, although is probably minor.
An important aspect of the most recent research looking at these issues
(Christie, 1999) was that the available data for cannabis expiation notices could
not be readily linked with subsequent court or other outcomes for all cases
where offenders failed to pay expiation fees. Expiation offence data in South
Australia since 1987 has been kept separately from criminal justice data, partly
because payment of an expiation fee is deemed not to constitute an admission
of guilt.
4
There has also never been an attempt to identify repeat offenders in

20
South Australia, irrespective of whether such recidivists pay expiation fees on
time or not. This contrasts with the more recently implemented system of formal
cautions for cannabis use offences in Victoria, where the identification of repeat
offenders is a key feature of the scheme.
Perhaps the most important reason for the observed low rate of expiation of
minor cannabis offences in South Australia is the level of misunderstanding of
the cannabis laws and of the consequences of failure to pay expiation fines. As
noted earlier, residents of South Australia and the Australian Capital Territory
have been found to be more misinformed than in other states about the legal
status of activities relating to personal cannabis use than in other parts of
Australia (Bowman & Sanson-Fisher, 1994). The low level of awareness of the
legal consequences of failure to expiate has been corroborated in a more recent
study conducted in South Australia. Of a group of offenders who did not expiate
minor cannabis offences, three quarters indicated that they were not aware that
they would have a criminal record as a result of not paying expiation fees
(Humeniuk et al, 1999). Given this lack of understanding of the illegal status of
cannabis in the South Australian community, particularly among users, it is no
wonder that the rate of payment of expiation fees has been low. This highlights
the importance of public education on the details of changes to legislation for
common activities such as cannabis use. Such education would be most
valuable at the time of introduction of legislative change, and should ideally be
supported by the provision of detailed information to offenders at the time of
offence detection and issuing of offence notices.
Whatever the reasons for the low rate of payment of expiation fees for cannabis
offences, it is of concern that large numbers of people have received criminal
convictions for minor cannabis offences, as a direct result of not paying
expiation fees with the specified time frame. This has been recognised by the
South Australian government, and some recent changes to the payment
provisions for expiable cannabis offences have been introduced, in order to try
and increase the number of expiation matters cleared. These new provisions
include options for payment of expiation fees by instalments, or working them off
through community service. It remains to be seen how these new options will
affect the outcomes for CEN offenders.

21
Other implementation issues have been touched upon elsewhere in this paper.
These include the importance of having efficient data recording and
management systems for offence data, particularly where expiation-type offence
data are kept separately from criminal justice data. It is important to be able to
track outcomes, including final disposition and penalties, for those expiation
matters which progress to formal prosecution. In practice, this is not an easy
task for many jurisdictions, because police, court and/or penalty information are
often maintained separately. To identify repeat offenders, a reliable system of
keeping track of expiable offences issued to the same person needs to be in
place. Improved procedures are also required to help police to correctly identify
offenders when issuing offence notices, and to follow up these offenders if
necessary. This may not necessitate extreme surveillance measures, but only
the more rigorous application of existing procedures for demanding proof of
identity from offenders.
Some of the implementation problems seen with the South Australian expiation
approach are clearly a result of there being a lack of experience with such
systems for cannabis offences, and a paucity of research and evaluation data to
inform the initial design of the system. Some of these problems emerged over
time, as inconsistencies within the system became apparent. An example was
the concern expressed by specialist drug enforcement officers that the expiable
cultivation limit of ten cannabis plants was being exploited by criminal cultivation
syndicates. The ten plant limit for the expiable cannabis cultivation offence was
justified as being reasonable for personal cannabis users, as growers would
probably lose some plants in the course of the growing cycle, and regular users
could supply their own needs by harvesting only what they required from the
growing plants. In reality, whole cannabis plants are usually harvested when
mature. When even one cannabis plant is harvested, the grower faces the risk of
being detected with a non-expiable amount of perhaps a kilogram or more of
dried cannabis, the limit for personal possession being 100 grams. With the
advent of hydroponic techniques and the cloning and hybridisation of cannabis
plants, the loss of plants has been reduced and yield increased. Therefore, it
has been argued that three plants in cultivation would be a more appropriate
limit for expiation.

22
SECTION 4 THE IMPACT OF DECRIMINALISATION IN THE UNITED STATES
5
4.1 General
In the United States, there was a movement in the United States in favour of
reforming marijuana laws throughout the 1970s. Widespread and increasing use
of marijuana despite its criminalisation had led to substantial enforcement and
court costs, and public attitudes were becoming more accepting of marijuana
use. In October 1973, Oregon reduced the offence of possession of less than 1
oz. of marijuana to a civil violation, with a maximum penalty of a $100 fine. From
1973 to 1978, 10 other states had enacted legislation which reduced the
maximum penalties for cannabis possession to a fine (Single, 1989).
6
The available data indicate that these decriminalisation measures had little or no
impact on rates of use. The evidence consists of four state evaluation studies
and three studies involving control groups or jurisdictions. On the other hand,
the decriminalisation measures substantially reduced the social costs associated
with the enforcement of marijuana laws.
4.2 Evaluations of decriminalisation measures in particular states
Statewide evaluations of decriminalisation measures were conducted in Oregon
(Drug Abuse Council, 1974), Maine (Maine Office of Alcoholism and Drug Abuse
Prevention, 1979), Ohio (Spitzner, 1979) and California (Budman, 1977). In
Oregon, a series of studies conducted after the change in law (Drug Abuse
Council, 1974-77) indicated no major change in rates of use, but given the lack
of data prior to the change (other than retrospective questions of dubious
reliability) no conclusive interpretation of the results is possible. In Maine, a
similar ex post facto
study by the Maine Office of Alcoholism and Drug Abuse
Prevention (1977) resulted in a very positive assessment of a decriminalisation
measure, despite the lack of data from before the change in law. In Ohio and
California, surveys were conducted before and after changes in the law
regarding cannabis possession. In Ohio, a decriminalisation measure went into
effect in November 1975. Among those aged 18-24, use increased from 27% in
1974 to 33% in 1978 (Spitzner, 1979), while among those aged 25-34 use
increased from 6% in 1974 to 19% in 1978. In California (Budman, 1977), the
proportion of adults reporting that they had ever used marijuana increased from

23
28% in February 1975 to 35% in November 1976, eleven months before and
after "decriminalisation."
Thus, all four state-wide evaluations of decriminalisation measures found
modest increases in rates of self-reported use. The authors of all of these
studies chose to interpret the increases as insignificant, deeming the
decriminalisation measures to be successful, although the very same data might
well have been used to support the opposite conclusion.
4.3 Controlled studies on the impact of decriminalisation
The major limitation with these early evaluations was the lack of control groups
or comparative data to provide an estimate of what one might have expected the
rates of use to be if there had been no change in the law. Three studies
conducted in the mid-1970s did use control groups.
Stuart and his colleagues (1976) analysed self-reported drug use in Ann Arbor
and three neighbouring communities in Michigan. The original purpose of the
study was not to assess the impact of changes in cannabis law. However, over
the brief course of the study, Ann Arbor unexpectedly went through four major
changes in cannabis policy: a reduction of penalties (but still involving possible
imprisonment), decriminalisation (maximum penalty of a $5 fine), reinstatement
of severe penalties, and finally, a return to "decriminalisation." Data collected at
four points in time in Ann Arbor and the control communities (which underwent
no changes in penalties for marijuana use) indicated that marijuana use was not
affected by the changes in law.
A second study involving a control group is a secondary analysis of four national
surveys conducted in the U.S. between 1972 and 1977 (Saveland and Bray,
1980; Single 1989). It was found that first, levels of use tended to be higher in
the decriminalisation states both before and after the changes in law. Second,
states which moderated penalties after 1974 (essentially a group of
decriminalisation states) did indeed experience an increase in rates of marijuana
use, among both adolescents (age 12-17) and adults (age 18 or older). This
corroborates the four state-wide evaluations noted above. However, the increase
in marijuana use was even greater in other states and the largest proportionate
increase occurred in those states with the most severe penalties.

24
The third controlled study involves the Monitoring the Future national surveys of
high school students. Johnston (1980) oversampled seniors in the
decriminalisation states and concluded that "Decriminalization has had
virtually no effect either on the marijuana use or on related attitudes and beliefs
about marijuana use among American young people in this age group" (Johnston
et
al., 1981:27, italics in original).
In the 1997 U.S. National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, respondents from
California were oversampled in order to assess the impact of a voter referendum
legalising marijuana for medical purposes (U. S. Department of Health and
Human Services, 1998b). It was found that there was no upward trend in
marijuana use in California either among adults or among youth aged 12-17.
The expectation of some that rates of cannabis use would be related to
decriminalisation measures or the legalisation of medical marijuana is based on
the expectation that such measures might impact on availability and
consequently on rates of use. It is not clear, however, that the reduction in
penalties under decriminalisation laws has any appreciable impact on
availability. (U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1998b). While
cannabis use remained relatively constant in the first half of the decade and then
increased slightly from 1995 to 1997, there was relatively little change in
perceived availability with approximately 60% of Americans reporting that it is
“fairly easy” or very easy” to obtain marijuana throughout the 1990s (U. S.
Department of Health and Human Services, 1998b).
Thus there is no apparent connection between the trends in use and the trends
in perceived availability. While the availability of cannabis appears to have
remained constant at relatively high levels, the upward trend in cannabis use
during the 1970s in both the decriminalisation and non-decriminalisation states
did not continue into the next decade. In the 1980s and early 1990s cannabis
use declined throughout the U.S. (U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services, 1998b). Attitudes became less accepting of cannabis use, particularly
among young persons, in both "decriminalised" and non-decriminalised states.
For example, annual surveys of students in California, a decriminalisation state,
found a trend toward less accepting attitudes toward marijuana use (Sommer,

25
1988). Nationally, only 22% of college freshmen supported legalisation of
marijuana in 1985, compared with 53% in 1977 (Astin et
al., 1987).
The decrease in cannabis use from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s appears to
be more strongly connected with changing perceptions of health risks rather than
availability or any changes in the legal status of the drug. In 1997, 58% of high
school seniors thought that there is great risk of harming oneself from smoking
marijuana regularly, compared with only 35% in 1978 (Johnston et al., 1998a).
As seen in Figure 1, there is a clear relationship in the U.S. National Household
Survey on Drug Abuse between perceived health risk and cannabis use from
1985-1997 among those aged 12-17. As perceived health risk increased in the
late 1980s, rates of cannabis use declined. As perceived health risk diminished
in the mid-1990s, rates of cannabis use began to rise again.
Figure 1: Trends in Cannabis Use and Perceived Risk of Cannabis Use Among
U.S. Population Aged 12–17, 1985–1997
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
1985 1988 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997
Proportion reporting
cannabis use in the past
month
Proportion perceiving
monthly use as "serious"
health risk
Proportion perceiving
weekly use as "serious"
health risk
4.4 Impacts on public use and the health care system
Impressionistic evidence concerning the impact of decriminalisation measures
on use in public indicated no impact. The National Governors' Conference
evaluation of marijuana policy in eight states, five of which had "decriminalised"
marijuana, concluded: "There is also concern that increased public display and
use may occur as a result of decriminalisation. Our interviews have indicated

26
that this has not occurred to any substantial extent" (National Governors'
Conference, 1977:1).
There was little evidence of any significant impacts on the health care system
(Single, 1989). Given the difficulties in detecting intoxication from cannabis
consumption, there was virtually no evidence concerning impact on the
incidence of driving under the influence of cannabis.
4.5 Impacts on drug enforcement costs and priorities
The beneficial consequences of decriminalisation consist mainly of savings to
law enforcement and the criminal justice system. In all of the decriminalisation
states, there were reductions in the number and nature of marijuana cases
processed through the law enforcement system. In California, marijuana
possession arrests declined by 36% in the first half of 1976 when
decriminalisation was in effect compared to the first half of 1975. These
comparatively low rates of arrest continued in the 1980s (Aldrich and Mikuriya,
1988). Similar decreases in marijuana possession arrests occurred in other
decriminalisation jurisdictions following the change in law: 43% in Minnesota,
possession arrests declined by 43% in Minnesota; 36% in Columbus, Ohio; and
41% in Denver, Colorado (National Governors' Conference, 1977). There is
some evidence that law enforcement in the decriminalisation states redirected
efforts toward the detection and arrest of more serious offences and other illicit
drugs. In California, marijuana charges other than simple possession (e.g.,
possession with intent to sell, trafficking, etc.) did not decline, as indicated by an
increase in felony arrests (Aldrich and Mikuriya, 1988).
The costs of cannabis enforcement to the police and courts declined in
decriminalisation states. There were generally sharp declines in the processing
of cannabis possession offenders, decreases in incarceration and increases in
revenues from fines. Consequently, the total cost of marijuana enforcement
declined substantially. For example, in California the total cost of marijuana
enforcement declined from $17 million in the first half of 1975 to under $4.4
million in the first half of 1976 (Budman, 1977).
It should be noted, however, that decriminalisation did not eliminate all of the
social costs associated with cannabis policy. Although cannabis possession is

27
no longer subject to incarceration in the decriminalisation states, it remains
against the law. The costs of processing possession cases has decreased, but
police powers of search and seizure still apply and must necessarily be broadly
applied as long as possession remains an offence. Further, depending on the
institutional arrangements for criminal record keeping in a particular jurisdiction,
as long cannabis possession is an offence, certain adverse individual
consequences are inevitable, particularly those negative consequences that flow
from the creation of a criminal record.

28
SECTION 5 SUMMARY OF THE IMPACTS OF DECRIMINALISATION
IN AUSTRALIA AND THE UNITED STATES
In sum, decriminalisation measures in the U.S. and Australia were much less
radical than their name implies. The new laws involved a change in penalties
whereby cannabis possession offenders were no longer subject to potential jail
terms, which had already been an uncommon sentence, as well as providing the
opportunity for possession offenders to avoid a criminal conviction and the
resultant problems. In both countries, these so-called decriminalisation laws did
not appear to have had a major impact on rates of use, as many feared that it
might have.
In Australia, the limited experience with an expiation model of decriminalisation,
or “prohibition with civil penalties”, has been successful in providing a response
to cannabis use which avoids the imposition of criminal convictions for all or
most offenders. Unfortunately, in South Australia, where most of the evaluation
activities have taken place, substantial numbers of offenders still ultimately
receive convictions because of a general “net-widening” in cannabis offence
detections, and the failure of a substantial proportion of offenders to pay
expiation fees on time. This in part relates to a poor understanding among
cannabis users of the legal consequences of not clearing expiation offences.
Despite such problems, the expiation approach has been viewed as a success
by a majority of law enforcement and criminal justice personnel, although some
implementation and ongoing operational difficulties have been raised. The
expiation approach appears to be more cost-effective compared to a system of
prohibition and prosecution of minor cannabis offences. As far as cannabis
offenders themselves are concerned, their experience of negative consequences
arising from being issued expiation notices (eg. employment, accommodation,
relationship problems) seems to be less than for offenders prosecuted for
personal cannabis use under a total prohibition approach. In terms of
deterrence, both the expiation and total prohibition approaches to cannabis use
seem to be equally ineffective in lessening cannabis offenders’ subsequent
cannabis or other drug use behaviours.
In the United States, decriminalisation resulted in substantial savings to drug
enforcement due to lower numbers of cannabis possession cases and increases
in fine revenues. These enforcement resources were generally redirected toward

29
the enforcement of trafficking offences and laws regarding other drugs. It cannot
be claimed that decriminalisation laws eliminated the social costs and adverse
individual consequences associated with cannabis prohibition, but it would
appear that decriminalisation succeeded in reducing enforcement costs without
increasing the health and safety hazards associated with use. Despite the weight
of evidence, decriminalisation has not been universally viewed as a success in
the United States. This may be in part due to lack of conclusive data--although
these measures received considerable attention by the public and in the media,
no national study on the impact of decriminalisation has ever been
commissioned. There is also an ongoing fear that cannabis decriminalisation
might lead to the liberalisation of policies regarding other illicit drugs.

30
SECTION 6 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
In order to assess and compare the impact of cannabis decriminalisation
measures, it is important to consider the goals of cannabis policy. In the United
States, the express purpose of cannabis policy is the prevention or cessation of
use, while in Australia the focus is placed on minimising the harms associated
with use. While this represents a significant difference in strategies to achieve
the goals of drug policy, the explicit aim in both countries is essentially the
same: to minimise the health and safety hazards associated with drug use.
But there is implicitly a second goal to drug policy that is not often expressed: to
minimise the social costs and adverse individual consequences that result from
attempts to control use. There are always limits, financial and otherwise,
regarding the extent to which efforts may be placed on reducing the harms
associated with drug use. Thus, policy considerations always entail balancing
the benefits of public policy against the costs involved in carrying out that policy.
Decriminalisation measures should therefore be judged not only terms of their
impacts on cannabis use and associated consequences to public health and
safety, but also in terms of their impacts on reducing enforcement and other
social costs involved in controlling cannabis use.
When this dualistic standard is applied to the impact of decriminalisation
measures in Australia and the United, we arrive at the following conclusions:
• The reduction of maximum penalties for cannabis possession to exclude the
possibility of receiving a jail sentence has had no discernible impact on
rates of cannabis use or problems associated with cannabis problems. This
was true in all of the jurisdictions in Australia and the United States that
enacted decriminalisation measures.
• Decriminalisation has led to substantial savings in drug enforcement and
other social costs. The extent to which these savings are realised, however,
is strongly moderated by the manner in which these measures are
implemented. In the case of the Cannabis Expiation Notice system of South
Australia, cost savings have also been realised, despite “net-widening” and

31
an unexpectedly low rate of payment of expiation fines. Clearly, even
greater savings would be realised if the rate of expiation had been greater.
• The conceptualisation of cannabis-related problems and associated policy
responses is more important than empirical evidence in both the public and
policy maker perceptions of the impact of decriminalisation. Although the
empirical evidence indicates that decriminalisation in the U.S. has been a
model of successful legal reform, reducing costs without affecting rates of
use, decriminalisation is more often viewed as a success in Australia where
implementation problems rendered similar measures to be somewhat less
successful. One cannot help but wonder if public opinion on
decriminalisation in both countries is based more on preconceived notions
of appropriate drug policy rather than empirical evidence.
• Part of the reason why ideology plays a key role in the perceived impact of
cannabis decriminalisation is that the empirical evidence is generally
inadequate. Decriminalisation measures have been typically enacted without
concern for evaluation or monitoring of impact. In the U.S., no study of the
impact of cannabis decriminalisation at the national level has ever been
commissioned. Those evaluations which have been commissioned at the
state level tend to be restricted to data collected after the change in policy
and without the development of a consensus concerning appropriate
success indicators.
• The manner in which decriminalisation measures are implemented by law
enforcement and criminal justice officials can influence the health and social
impacts of these measures. In South Australia, the apparent lack of
education for the public, and for cannabis offenders in particular, about the
status of cannabis use offences under the expiation model, seems to have
led to a general under-estimation of the seriousness of personal use
offences, and consequently an unexpectedly high proportion of unpaid
expiation fees and resultant convictions for fee defaulting.
In light of these conclusions, the following recommendations are offered for
those jurisdictions considering the enactment of decriminalisation measures:

32
• Decriminalisation and similar law reform measures should be subject to
systematic evaluation of impact. These could include factors such as:
collection of baseline data before new legislative measures are
implemented; establishment of ongoing data collection and monitoring
systems for offence statistics; regular updates regarding the impact on
patterns of use, as measured by population surveys of drug use;
establishment of systems for monitoring costs of enforcement; and surveys
of offenders and key informants to gauge unintended consequences.
• Issues and potential problems of implementation should be fully considered
and, in so far as possible, dealt with. Consideration should be given to
alternative procedures that might avoid implementation problems, eg. the
provision of delayed payment or payment in instalments in an expiation
system. The South Australian experience with the expiation approach has
highlighted the importance of being prepared to “fine tune” the operational
parameters of the system to achieve greater efficiency, and the need for
public awareness to be enhanced regarding any changes to legislative
approach for such a widespread activity as cannabis use.
• The relevant impacts to be considered and the specific success indicators
should be developed in close consultation with all relevant parties, including
public health agencies, law enforcement agencies, social welfare agencies,
users and non-government organisations. Impacts should include not only
rates of use but also patterns of use likely to lead to harm, harm indicators,
impacts on law enforcement practices and priorities, impacts on the courts
and penal system, economic impacts and the extent to which users are
marginalised by a particular policy.
• The enactment of decriminalisation and similar legal reforms should be
timed such that relevant data can be collected prior to as well as after the
change in policy.
• The evaluation of impact and monitoring of success indicators should not
only consider impacts over a relatively short period of time such as one or
two years, but also longer term impacts.

33
In sum, decriminalisation measures in both the United States and Australia have
generally led to significant savings in drug enforcement without leading to
increases in cannabis use. Lesser savings were achieved in the state of South
Australia than in other decriminalisation jurisdictions, however, due to
implementation problems. The greater ease with which expiation notices could
be handed out has resulted in more cannabis offenders being formally dealt with
by police. Further, many expiation offenders failed to take advantage of the
opportunity to avoid criminal conviction by paying expiation fees on time. Steps
are being taken to redress these problems and it is expected that greater
benefits from the Cannabis Expiation Notice scheme to the criminal justice
system will be realised in the near future.
Thus, the shift in approach to cannabis possession, towards a penalty system
which provides offenders with an option to avoid criminal conviction (and away
from incarceration as a possible sentence) is in many ways a model of
successful drug law reform, with clear benefits and few, if any, adverse
consequences. The key aspect of cannabis decriminalisation is that it does not
appear to lead to increases in availability, use or problems associated with
cannabis use. There are several reasons for this. Controls over cannabis
availability probably have had less impact on cannabis use and cannabis
problems than they do with regard to other illicit drugs. Cannabis is a drug with
limited addictive potential. Its effects are often described as pleasant, but it is
not as strongly reinforcing as other illicit drugs such as heroin or cocaine, the
use of which is more likely to lead to compulsive or dependent use (eg. see Hall
et al, 1994).
Cannabis use is very popular, cannabis being by far the most widely used illicit
drug in both countries. The cannabis market has been described in the U.S. as
being “near-saturation” (Goode, 1993) and this would probably also apply to
Australia as well. Most people know someone who could either obtain cannabis
for them or put them in touch with someone who could. While thousands of
young persons have been arrested and criminally processed for cannabis
possession, the risk of arrest is probably much smaller than it is for cocaine,
heroin or other illicit drugs. The major constraint on cannabis use is concern
about adverse health effects rather than fear of legal consequences.

34
Under these circumstances, it should not be surprising that the reduction of
penalties for cannabis possession to a fine only did not lead to significant
changes in rates of cannabis use. The success of decriminalisation should not
be taken to indicate that the use of cannabis is without risk or that legalisation
would also have little or no impact. Cannabis use can become compulsive,
problems may result even from casual use, and a sudden expansion of
availability under a legalisation system could well lead to significant increases in
rates of use and consequently on the number of persons who experience
problems as a result of their use. But decriminalisation has not changed the
availability or use of cannabis in a significant manner. Thus, decriminalisation
succeeded in reducing social costs without increasing the problems associated
with use in the U.S. and Australia, but this success should not be interpreted to
indicate that the same impacts would necessarily apply either to the legalisation
of cannabis or to the decriminalisation of other illicit drugs.

35
NOTES
1
Harwood et al. (1998). Table 6.2. This figure does not include private expenditures such as legal
counsel fees.
2
One of the authors of this article evaluated the National Drug Strategy on behalf of the Commonwealth
government in 1996-97 (Single and Rohl, 1997). After completing their report, the evaluators received
several letters from distraught parents whose children had died from drug overdose. A common reaction
was to question the wisdom of marginalising drug users, driving them away from help that might have
saved their children’s lives. As one parent put it: “Something’s wrong with our current system—whatever
it is that we are doing isn’t working. We’ve got to find a better way of dealing with drugs in our
community” (quoted in Single and Rohl, 1998).
3
The exceptions are when a case is dismissed or the defendant is found not guilty, but this occurs in
only a minority of cases.
4
It would appear that, until fairly recently, the size of the expiation data files was beyond what could be
readily manipulated by the available computer systems, particularly when tracking of final outcomes for
all offenders involved creating linkages to even larger criminal justice databases on court findings and
penalty outcomes.
5
For a more detailed description of the impact of decriminalisation in the U.S., see Single (1989).
6
In some cases, the maximum penalty of a fine applied to first offenders only. Oregon later rescinded its
decriminalization law following a referendum in 1990. Another state enacted a decriminalisation
measure in this time period and later repealed it. South Dakota reduced the maximum penalty for
possession of less than 1 oz. of marijuana to a $20 fine in April of 1977, but this law was subsequently
repealed in 1989. The possession of marijuana in the privacy of a residence was held by the state’s
highest court to be unconstitutional in Alaska but cannabis possession was recriminalized in 1990
(Goode, 1993). Thus at any given time, there have been between 9 and 11 states with decriminalisation
laws which reduced the penalty for cannabis possession to a fine only.

36
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