The proceedings of the Opium Committee and still more of the conferences which it organized, were the scene of violent language and hasty action to a degree unknown among other organs of the League.
F. P. Walters, A History of the League of Nations

If, as Walters observed, the Advisory Opium Committee members were not given to restraint in their debates, the same cannot be said of their successors in the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs, many of whom are practitioners of elegant diplomacy. Yet in many other respects the two organs do resemble each other; the fundamental control problems remain the same, as do the dimensions of conflicting interests. These interests are still active, but practical considerations, such as the sheer number of states which have been added, dictate that disputes do not too frequently frustrate all action. Indeed, attempts to settle most disputes are probably made by interested (or aggrieved) parties outside the formal meeting. Hadwen and Kaufmann observe (1962):

most UN decisions are settled by informal negotiating processes outside the formal meetings.... The UN visitor, therefore, hears, except in cases of major conflict, the public explanation of what has been agreed privately.

The membership of the Commission has been enlarged along with the general increase in the membership of the UN. From an organ of fifteen member states, the Commission has developed into one with a membership of thirty states. The composition of the Commission is determined both with a view to the subject of its concern and by the political considerations of the overall membership policy of the UN itself, which purports to exclude states which are not "peace-loving." The original criteria for selecting members—that there should be adequate representation of those countries which are drug producers or manufacturers, or are victims of the illicit traffic—reflected the functionalist approach, while political factors were clearly operating, for instance, in the decision of the Commission in 1946 to exclude from the then existing drug treaties "the Franco Government in Spain for so long as this Government is in power" (E/168). The increase in the membership from fifteen to twenty-one it 1961 was part of a general expansion of the functional commissions of ECOSOC to make room for the increased membership of the UN. This was also the case with the increase from twenty-one to twenty-four members in 1967. However, the honor of having belonged to the original fifteen is to a large extent preserved in a kind of "gentlemen's club" which has evolved with the continual renewal of contact between the same delegates attending the yearly sessions of the Commission over the years (Lowes, 1966: 163 and 181). The Commission's membership is further discussed in Appendix C.

The duration of the regular sessions of the Commission has been quite stable but their frequency has been reduced by ECOSOC in 1969 from once every year to once every other year. That 153 individuals representing 51 states and 17 international organizations participated in the 1971 session gives an indication of the size of the present meetings. For every session the Commission elects a chairman, two vice-chairmen, and a rapporteur, and these constitute the Bureau. Those elected to the Bureau function until the next session, and what this means in formal terms is that the chairman performs such functions as signing letters, accepting proposals for agenda items for the next meeting, and playing a mediating role between consecutive sessions. These office-bearers succeed each other. Thus the rapporteur of the previous session becomes the second vice-chairman of the subsequent session, while the erstwhile second vice-chairman becomes first vice-chairman. The first vice-chairman of the last session in turn becomes this session's chairman. In addition there is a standing committee composed of the Bureau and the chairmen of previous sessions. The meetings of the Narcotics Commission, like most UN meetings, are an occasion for consultation between participants, for the special views of the various agencies and organizational units to be aired, and for arriving at some recommendations. To some extent these activities are bound to be contained within the framework of custom, styles of action, and precedents which have been set through the years and which have become the very basis of the Commission's operations. They are circumscribed, too, by the range of information or choice of emphasis offered in memoranda prepared by the secretariat and circulated among delegations.

The views and concerns of the Commission are best reflected in the resolutions it drafts and adopts. With this in mind, we have systematically analyzed the contents of all the resolutions appearing in the report of each session of the Commission to ECO SOC, from its first to its twenty-third session, on the assumption that this is a means of studying not only the priorities, preoccupations, and activities of the Commission but also its roles relative to other bodies or agencies. Moreover, by studying the resolutions for the entire period of the Commission's existence, it may be possible to see what changes have occurred in the type of issues with which it has been concerned and the kind of approach it has adopted towards them.

A limitation of this analysis is that it is based entirely on resolutions as they finally come to be worded and ignores those features of the text which have been dropped or modified through successive drafts. Thus the resolutions analyzed represent only the resultant of all the positions which have been taken during the debate on the question at issue. Furthermore, a resolution which goes on record as a Commission decision does not necessarily have the support of all its members, as can readily be seen from the voting pattern on resolutions. We have not, however, studied voting behavior because the breakdown of votes is not always on record.

Nevertheless, resolutions do focus and express the collective will; they reflect the issues which receive the attention of the Commission and the majority response to them. We assume that every drug issue of a politically significant nature will be covered by at least one resolution, and that the number of resolutions addressed to a particular problem area signifies either its perceived importance, or its persistence and intractability, or that because of its political sensitivity only pressure cumulatively applied by way of repetitive resolutions is thought to have any effect. The form of the resolutions has undergone some changes over time, but generally speaking it depends on the addressee to whom it is directed. A typical resolution begins with a number of paragraphs in which previous UN materials, pronouncements, or decisions are cited, the subject matter is introduced, the background is sketched, and tone set. Following the preambular paragraphs are the operative paragraphs which make recommendations or express attitudes or call for particular actions to be taken both within or outside the UN system.

In Appendix C we have tabulated, for the years from 1946 to 1971, the number of resolutions which have been passed by the Commission and their breakdown by year and type. The scheme of classification underlying the table requires a few wofds of explanation. First, only those expressions which the Commission itself calls resolutions are included; in the first few years of the Commission's existence resolutions were interspersed among similar statements not specifically called resolutions. These are excluded frotn our list. In later years, however, resolutions were clearly and separately enumerated in the reports. Other changes are apparent; similar statements about forthcoming meetings may be formulated as resolutions in some cases and made in ordinary terms in others. However, there has been sufficient consistency over the years to allow comparison. In Appendix C we have enumerated those resolutions which specifically refer to a country or region on the one hand, and to a drug or group of drugs on the other. Each resolution is assigned to either or both of these categories. Because of multiple assignment—for example, a resolution which names a drug and a country in its text will be assigned to both categories—the total frequency counts do not equal the total number of resolutions. To be counted at all among the drug-specific categories, a resolution has to contain the name of a drug or group of drugs. The name of a drug many be omitted because of the low level of the Commission's concern with it or because of a deliberate broadening of the terms in which the resolution is cast. Indeed, resolutions touching national interests are seldom passed without a substantial dilution of their original contents.
The Commission on Narcotic Drugs and the Division    91

There are altogether 159 resolutions for the period from 1946 to 1971. Roughly a fifth of the total resolutions adopted mention a country or region and more than half are drug-specific. The country-specific resolutions are more evenly distributed among the years than the drug-specific ones. We see that a marked increase in the number of resolutions occurred in 1954 and a less marked decrease from about 1961. It seems reasonable therefore to compare the periods 1946-53, 1954-62, and 1963-71.

In table 7.1 the resolutions are classified by type of drug and region for each of the three periods mentioned above. The period from 1954 to 1962 strikes one immediately as the golden era of resolutions. Resolutions were less frequent in the last period than in the first although the latter covers fewer years. As for the regions, there are curious differences. The Commission appears to have been quite concerned with the Andean region and the Far East in the first period and almost not at all in the second period, during which interest is focused on the Middle East, where it has continued to hover. Although not shown in the table, Peru is the most frequently mentioned among individual countries.

One notes that almost all resolutions in the regional category refer or are addressed to the producers of "natural" classical narcotics (that is, to the developing countries); industrialized producing countries hardly ever feature. In 1946 Japan and Germany—two countries from which there was much illicit diversion—were the countries addressed. The tendency to designate as problem countries only the weak ones—in this instance the Third World states or those defeated in war—is also noticeable elsewhere (see chapter 10).

As far as the frequency of drug types is concerned, opium gets predominant attention, representing over 40 percent of the total number of references to drug types. The dominance disappears in the third period. Cannabis began to figure in resolutions when its prohibition was being considered. The interest in coca leaf/ cocaine has lingered but has declined compared to earlier years. During the second period "new synthetics" commanded much attention. "Psychotropics" appear for the first time in the 1954- 62 period and khat and LSD between 1963 and 1971.

We had intended also, originally, to analyze the resolutions in terms of the kind of action prescribed by them, the level of action called for (such as national or international), and the international bodies (such as FAO or INCB) addressed. But we abandoned this exercise because the texts of the resolutions are often too vague to allow clear-cut classification. If the directives contained in resolutions form the basis of the secretariat's work, tremendous problems of interpretation must occur. Many resolutions are restatements of general concern and exhortations to countries to adhere to treaties. In fact, most resolutions are addressed to governments, requesting or urging them to take action on a particular issue. Many of the resolutions of the second period enlist the help of the specialized agencies, especially WHO and FAO, to provide technical assistance to countries.

It is noteworthy that the spate of resolutions occurring in the second period coincides with the tenure of Gilbert Yates as director of the Division of Narcotic Drugs. We are told by members of the Division that the subsequent fall in number was in response to an indication by ECOSOC (to which the resolutions are ultimately submitted) that it did not have the time to deal with so many. Whatever the reason, the coincidence leads to the inference that the Secretariat has a hand in the drafting of resolutions. In fact many resolutions originate from the Division, and before submitting a draft resolution to the Commission delegation members would often hold consultations over the wording of the text with secretariat members.

We have seen in Chapter 4 that the resources of the Division greatly overshadow those of the other drug units. But this does not reflect its prestige or reputation within the UN. In the League days, too, the reputation of the Opium Section was relatively low compared with other sections of the organization, partly because its staff members were recruited from among the ranks of the diplomats available in Geneva at the time, and employment was offered to them more as a reward for past services than in expectation of their making contributions to future action (Pastuhov, 1943: 14).

An idea of the range of official duties performed by the Division and the structuring of manpower around them may be gained from table 7.2 below. This gives the projected program components of the Division's work and their corresponding man-month requirements at the two levels into which the UN Secretariat is divided, the professional and the general service, for the years 1972 and 1968, the latter year being the first for which such a breakdown is available.

The table suggests that although 1972 shows an increase over 1968 in terms of professional manpower requirements and a decrease in the man-month requirements of the consultant category, the period between those years is marked by relative stability. The formal definition and organization of tasks remain the same, as do the manpower requirements of the general service category. The latter fact is somewhat surprising given the increase in the proportion of professional manpower requirements and seems to suggest that either a great deal of routine work is being carried out by the professional staff or that the output of the professionals is not sufficiently large to warrant additional supporting services from the lower category.

The items of work listed correspond to the headings of the Division's report to the Commission: National Laws and Regulations, Illicit Traffic, Drug Addiction, and so on. It appears that work is assigned to professionals on the basis of well-established subject sectors which in turn reflect the kinds of information which treaty provisions require that countries supply to the secretary-general. Thus many of the program components relate to the collection, analysis (usually for trends), and reporting of information given to the secretariats by governments under their treaty obligations. This information is often quite inadequate. It is also unreliable; this is bound to be the case when, for example, prevalence of use is established on the basis of returns from governments that give "abusive consumption" data without the term being defined. A discussion between representatives at the twenty-fourth session of the Commission is illustrative. Vaille of France argued for the retention of the term "multiple addiction" in a draft resolution on cannabis because, he said, "the Secretary-General's note on drug abuse (E/CN.7/534) contained a number of tables which gave data on the abuse of cannabis in association with other narcotic and psychotropic drugs." The U.K. representative (Stewart) questioned the applicability of the term "multiple addiction" to cannabis use, and pointed out that "the information supplied by his own Government concerning cannabis users was based on criminal convictions for the possession of the drug, which in itself constituted no proof of addiction" (E/CN. 7/SR. 716:11). A further illustration of the inaccuracy of such reporting is provided by a cross-national study of prevalence, based on UN data, which showed that by such a measure developing countries had more drug problems than developed ones (Blum, 1969: 174, 175). It is evident from the last two sessions of the Commission (CND:24th, 1971; 25th, 1973) that the questionnaires used for such reporting are in need of overhauling, and this is in fact being attempted.

The paucity of information in the national annual reports to the UN may be illustrated by reference to the contents of the 1971 returns under the heading "drug abuse" (on conditions in 1970). A systematic study of these reveals the limited value of the information given. The reports are on the whole brief, the most laconic being those submitted by Nauru, Western Samoa, and Sweden. National conditions are depicted on the basis of observations (for example, on "drug addicts") made by official agencies, law enforcement authorities, and medical practitioners; none of the data are based on scientific studies carried out on representative population samples. Some of the information given is not without quaintness: Honduras, for example, reports that it has two addicts and provides their names, while Monaco admits to only one, an eighty-five-year-old woman who takes drugs in her whisky. However, the more sophisticated statistical tables given by such countries as Canada, the U.S., and West Germany are no less heuristic and bear little relation to the figures yielded by investigations carried out by researchers in these countries. Burma, on the other hand, strikes an honest note when it remarks that it is "very difficult to get a correct estimate of opium addicts, and it is feared that actual figures may be more"—a summing-up which may be generalized to all countries. All this is complicated by the lack of standardized terminology: for example, while the U.S. reports no "cannabis addicts," West Germany does (346 among those taking one drug only). As far as implementing international obligations is concerned, Burma again demonstrates an important point when it reports that "attempts are being made with some success to bring Kokang area under effective administrative control"; and, "The question of extension of narcotic laws to the area east of Salween river is also under consideration by the Government." These remarks highlight a situation typical of a number of developing countries, namely, the insecure foothold which central government control has in the areas of drug production. The reports on international trade indicate a lack of articulation between import and export controls. A number of countries complain that copies of export authorizations sent to governments of importing countries have not been returned. The U.S. reports 107 instances of such omissions, the U.K. 362 (representing 25 percent of all authorizations), Belgium 73 and so on. Israel states that it has yet to receive the copies which it reported as missing for the years 1965-69. The Netherlands maintains "that, in fact, the issue of import licences by the authorities of importing countries renders superfluous any check on the part of the exporting countries as to possible exceeding of the estimate for those countries, and that such a check can be carried out only by the International Narcotics Control Board."

Some countries include comments on the international system in their reports. For instance, Thailand reports that at the UN Training and Consultative Course held at the Parusakawau Palace in Bangkok, a series of lectures "of enduring interest on narcotic control" was given by four European UN officials. The Republic of Korea expresses great appreciation for the information bulletin of the UN Narcotics Division, which was found to benefit the government policies.

An important item of the program is what is referred to as scientific research being carried out by the UN Laboratory. Set up in 1955, the Laboratory was an outcome of a number of resolutions adopted by ECOSOC (1959 II C [VII]; 246 F [IX]) and the General Assembly (834 [IX]). The program for which it was established was the development of chemical methods for the determination of the geographical origin of opium. This was considered to be of great value in identifying the sources of illicit traffic. Chemical tests for this purpose have been developed based on comparing the analytical data for seized opium with data for opium samples of known origins. It is said that, where adequate numbers of authenticated samples are available from a country or region,-it is possible to determine whether a seizure stemmed from that country. Nevertheless, geographical origin of seized opium has remained a matter of much contention in the Commission (see chapter 15). Obviously, since the opium poppy does not respect national borders, it is not possible to decide, on the basis of such tests, whether a sample of seized opium has come from a particular country if that country was one of several contiguous opium-growing countries. The determination of the origin of opium is now considered to be of lesser importance in view of the changing patterns in the illicit traffic within recent years. Opium now travels lesser distances in the illicit traffic because the morphine base (which is much easier and more profitable to smuggle) is being extracted from the opium nearer the place of production of the opium (Braenden, interview), and priority is now given, on the Commission's instructions, to other projects (E/CN.7/537, 1971: 26). The Commission had decided that "research on opium had reached an advanced stage, and that methods developed for the determination of the origin of opium were very satisfactory." The view'was expressed that the Laboratory should devote more attention to cannabis research and to "other drugs of interest to the Commission" (CND. 20th, 1965: 33).

In 1959 a cannabis research program was initiated the purpose of which was, again, the identification of samples as a step towards countering illicit traffic (Commission resolution 8 [XIVD. More recently, interest was expressed in research on the development of tests for the detection of cannabis users that can be employed in cases of automobile accidents in a way similar to that of blood tests for alcohol. However, it is clear that most of the work is done by collaborating scientists in various countries, the resources of the Laboratory being sufficient for little beyond maintaining a "reference" sample of cannabis which can be sent to collaborating scientists on request. Such collaboration adds to the status of the Laboratory.

The activities of the Laboratory are not confined to research alone. It maintains a scientific literature collection and periodically issues theList of Narcotic Drugs under International Control. It also provides training, initially in methods for determining opium origin but now on a broader basis, to holders of fellowships awarded to chemists from developing countries under the UN technical assistance scheme.

The Laboratory was founded for an activity which, according to its director, is now obsolete. While events have demanded a reformulation of objectives, it is difficult to discern what these are from Commission discussions. Research interest has been lodged in areas relevant to law enforcement, and this choice is likely to have long-term effects on future research priorities.

One of the Division's most important functions is the provision of information. A vehicle of information dissemination is the Bulletin on Narcotic Drugs which was created by a resolution adopted by the Commission in 1948. The Bulletin is not only a scientific journal, it also conveys much information on the activities of the international drug control bodies. In fact such material constitutes about half of the Bulletin's contents, the rest being largely made up of solicited articles. Few articles submitted for publication are rejected, for the number received is not high (Sotiroff, Khan, interviews). Authors are often drawn from those with whom the Division has direct contact, such as those attending UN meetings. Moreover, representatives at the Commission sessions may suggest writers or submit articles, so that the risk of papers appearing in the Bulletin with views very divergent from those of the Commission members is rather small. Nevertheless, room for disagreement existed, as the following incident shows.

At the twentieth session of the Commission, Harry Anslinger of the U.S. delegation, in connection with the publication of a paper by Dr. Oswald Moraes Andrade entitled "The Criminogenic Action of Cannabis and Narcotics" (16, 4), raised the question of the policy followed by the secretariat in its selection of articles: "no article," said Anslinger, "had done so much harm to the Commission's work. . . . It was difficult to see how such a study could have been accepted, since everything published in that field by or under the auspices of the UN was diametrically opposed to the thesis developed in the article" (E/CN.7/SR 538). He continued to say that

the purpose of the Bulletin should be to educate the public, not to give it arms with which to fight the policy advocated by the Commission. Certain groups in the US were already using the article in an attempt to obtain legal authorization for the use of marihuana. In the circumstances, he would like to know how the Secretariat envisaged its functions as the organ responsible for the publication of the Bulletin.

In the discussion which followed, Mabileau of France and Curran of Canada supported this view, the latter suggesting that an editorial committee be formed of members of the Commission to select the articles for publication. The secretariat was defended by the representatives of the United Kingdom and Yugoslavia. The latter (Nicolié) recalled that in the past an article contributed by the U.S. had been published in which a negative attitude had been taken towards the Single Convention despite the fact that ECOSOC had urged the ratification of the treaty. Green of the United Kingdom thought that

It was clearly very embarrassing for a government when an article appearing in a UN publication was quoted against it . . . . He personally did not know what the aims of the Bulletin were. . . . Reference had been made to the view of the Commission. But the Commission did not always have a single view and it was difficult to decide at what point a minority view should be regarded.

Sotiroff of the secretariat replied as follows:

It was not easy to find interesting articles, particularly as authors had to be drawn from as many regions as possible . . . the articles appearing in the Bulletin were usually obtained through official channels and often through representatives of the various countries in the Commission itself. The article to which reference had been made had been received from the representative of the country from which the author had come and had been signed by the latter. The Secretariat did not have a special editorial group for the Bulletin . . . The great majority of articles were in keeping with the general views expressed by the Commission though occasionally that was not so. The Secretariat was of course, ready to follow the instructions the Commission cared to give it concerning the choice of the articles.

It was finally decided that the Bulletin should continue to be edited by the Division in consultation with the representatives of WHO and PCB, but if it was considered that a matter of policy, whether administrative or legal, was involved the articles in question should be referred to the officers of the Commission for a second opinion. In the event of the officers being equally divided in their views, the article should not be published.
These are nonetheless exceptional cases, and the editors do not on the whole feel any constraint beyond the occasional need to exercise some care in their selection of articles for publication.
We subjected the content of the Bulletin to systematic analysis, and the results are given in the table in Appendix D. All issues of the Bulletin from 1949 to 1971 were analyzed. In order to obtain a rough impression of the changes over time, we divided the span of years under review into two periods. The periods are unequal in duration because issues were slimmer in the earlier period, and the cut-off point was chosen so as to balance this fact. The method used in compiling the figures is explained in a footnote to the table.

The table shows the dominance of the basic sciences category throughout the entire period. This dominance was less marked, however, in the later period, when articles in the medical and social sciences categories became more frequent. In this the Bulletin reflects the general multidisciplinary trend. The breakdown of articles by drug shows, as did our earlier analysis of the Commission's resolutions, the prominence of the opiates. It is noteworthy that there were almost twice as many "drug-specific" articles in the earlier period than in the later one, whereas the total number of cannabis articles doubled after 1961.

The figures for the country or regional settings of articles show that the United States is the best covered of all the countries which have been featured in the Bulletin. The largest increase in frequency over the years is that observed for the United Kingdom. Surprisingly, the Middle East has not been featured much in the years since 1962 despite the attention which Iran, Turkey, and Lebanon have received in discussions in the Commission and among INCB members. The explanation for this is suggested by the preponderance of North American and Western European contributors to the Bulletin. In fact, of the articles classified, 59 percent in the earlier period and 66 percent in the later period were written by authors from North America or Western Europe. In general, and as confirmed by Sotiroff in the interview touched upon earlier, articles on special geographical areas are written by authors from those areas. This explains the parallel changes in frequency over time between geographical setting and author background for India and the United Kingdom. However, there are instances where the authors from a particular area are fewer than articles on that area. This is true for Latin America, for Asia excluding India, and for Africa. This suggests that authors from Western countries do write about non-Western countries. However, the opposite is not the case; that is, articles on Western countries are not written by Asians, Africans, or Latin Americans.

The statistics so far discussed do not, of course, represent criteria for an assessment of the quality of the Bulletin. For this we must turn to a study made by the UN Joint Inspection Unit (JIU) of the publications and documentation of the UN. The JIU found that while the Bulletin had a good index and was promptly issued, a "User Survey" in which UN officials and subscribers were asked to rate the Bulletin on a scale of "Very Useful," "Useful," and "Not Useful" gave it a fairly low rating (JIU/REP/ 7/18, 1971). Commenting on the JIU report, the director of the Division said that the negative views expressed were at variance with the opinion of the Commission. Far from thinking, as the JIU did, that the Bulletin should be "significantly changed or merged with other publications," the Commission was considering wider coverage and distribution with possible support from the UN Fund for Drug Abuse Control. It was claimed, moreover, that there were other indications of its usefulness, such as the fact that it has frequently been referred to in articles published in other drug journals, notably the International Journal of the Addictions and the British Medical Journal (Letter, 26 October 1971).

Apart from the Bulletin, the Division has one other periodical publication: the Information Letter, which is distributed gratis to about nine thousand readers and is financed by UNFDAC. The contents include notices of drug seizures, meetings on drug matters, programs of the Division, news on treaty adherences and contributions to UNFDAC, and resumés of the contents of the latest issue of the Bulletin on Narcotics. The earlier issues carried short descriptions of the internationally controlled drugs. But, apart from occasional commentary, news rather than appraisal is the chief feature of the publication.