The U.S. Andean Drug Strategy: Why it is Failing in Peru
Abstract
This thesis will demonstrate Peru's inability to physically operate and politically control large sections of the country, is the result of eroded internal state sovereignty. The decline of Peru's internal sovereignty is a function of economic, ethnic, and social cleavages which have remained virtually unchanged since the Spanish Conquest of the Inca in 1533. As a result, Peru evolved into a polarized society which is ethnically and culturally divided, with a substantially wide margin between state authority and rural social autonomy. This marginalization of state sovereignty has facilitated the emergence and growth of the Shining Path insurgency, which has coupled with the expanding cocaine trade. Together these two processes have accelerated the erosion of functional sovereignty in Peru. Given this reality, the policy goals set forth by the 1992 National Drug and Control Strategy remain unattainable in Peru, and have little prospect for success.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Dec 01, 1993
- Accession Number
- ADA278006
Entities
People
- Richard B. Cutting
Organizations
- Naval Postgraduate School