The freedom of prohibition: Banning drugs in a liberal democracy.

Abstract

This thesis offers an insight into whether drug prohibition laws can be justified within a liberal democracy. It offers a detailed outline of the values of drug prohibition laws, the values of a liberal democracy and whether all these values are compatible with one another. Guided by the liberal democratic theories of Rawls, Dworkin and Scanlon the arguments made by De Marneffe in favour of drug prohibition laws within a liberal democracy are being revised. This is done by arguing whether they are sound but also by complementing them and seeing whether they hold for every kind of drug instead of just cocaine and heroin. When it turns out this is not always the case the main argument on which all De Marneffe’s other arguments rest is also being revised and later on discarded, meaning that his argumentation that justifies drug prohibition laws within a liberal democracy is no longer reasonable.