The emergence of the affected adult family member in drug policy discourse: A Foucauldian perspective

Abstract

The affected adult family member has increasingly received attention in drug research, policy and practice fields; however, this development has received limited critical and theoretical examination with respect to the presuppositions underpinning its rationale. Using a Foucauldian theoretical perspective, this article traces how families have been problematised in the treatment and rehabilitation domains of Irish drug policy and considers the political implications. A post-structuralist method, Bacchi’s (2009) “What’s the Problem Represented to Be?” approach, is applied to the analysis of eight drug policy documents published in Ireland between 1971 and 2009. Families are constructed as contributing to both the problem and solution of adolescent drug use. They are imagined as a key resource in treatment of adult drug use but as needing support in this role; and, as such they are constructed as service users in their own right. Families are governed through responsibilisation. The behavioural policy solutions are individualising and preclude alternative solutions that address political, socio-economic and gender inequalities that shape the experiences of affected families. The findings may be used as a starting point for critical reflection on the assumptions and privileged forms of knowledge and expertise that are shaping policy and practices relating to affected families.

Keywords:

• Drug policy
• families
• governmentality studies
• Foucault
• sociology

Acknowledgements

Funding for this research has been provided by the Irish Research Council. I would like to thank the editor and two anonymous reviewers for their time and effort in providing detailed and constructive comments on an earlier version of this article.

Declaration of interest

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

Notes

1. A limited review of drug policy documents in other jurisdictions was conducted. This was restricted to European countries that had documents in English published on the EMCDDA website, the United States and Australia.

2. In Psychiatric Power, Foucault (2006) discusses this function of the bourgeois family in nineteenth century France.