Culture matters! Changes in the global landscape of cannabis

Over the past 10–20 years, there has been a growing number of studies dealing with cannabis users’ identities (e.g. Bilgrei et al., 2021; Hammersley et al., 2001; Järvinen & Ravn, 2014), the stigma they maneuver (Dumbili, 2020; Hathaway, 2004), for example through neutralization techniques (Järvinen & Demant, 2011) and the symbolic boundaries distinguishing them from both other drug users and mainstream culture (Copes, 2016; Sandberg, 2012a). This literature has advanced the study of cannabis beyond the confines of the enduring normalization debate (Pennay & Measham, 2016) and expanded upon the cultural and societal characteristics of cannabis use. With this special issue, we want to forefront studies demonstrating how culture matters for our understanding of cannabis, and explore how simplified and general statements about use patterns and trends are challenged when seen from a more global perspective.

The aims of this special issue might be particularly important in light of contemporary cannabis liberalization (Oldfield et al., 2021; Søgaard et al., 2021). Processes of decriminalization or regulation and increasing acceptance differ considerably around the world and should be viewed as processes rather than as single events (Hammond et al., 2020). In what can be described as the onto-politics of cannabis, drug cultures, user identities, and state policies are continuously made, unmade, and transformed (Søgaard & Lerkkanen, 2021), creating new cultural meanings, and leaving users with new dilemmas and choices. Although some Anglo-Saxon countries that dominate the research literature show signs of normalization (Pennay & Measham, 2016), these tendencies have always been contested (e.g. Measham & Shiner, 2009) – and as demonstrated by this special issue – cannabis is still heavily stigmatized in many places throughout the world. There is a great variety of cannabis practices and symbolism, and the drug has a long history of being associated with a liquid and highly adaptable subculture (Sandberg, 2013). Indigenous use, and use in ritual settings (Kohek et al., 2021) are other reasons why a local and cultural perspective is essential in cannabis research.

Contemporary transformations of cannabis markets can be plotted on a continuum from prohibition via forms of decriminalization to legalization and regulated sales (Palamar et al., 2014; Stevens, 2019; Williams & Bretteville-Jensen, 2014). The existence of many different cannabis policies adds further complexity to understanding the drug and highlights the necessity of having both a global perspective and a local approach when exploring for example cannabis markets. There is no single way to understand or analyze interactions within such a supply system, and sometimes it comes down to explaining the dynamics of particular marketplaces (e.g. Moeller, 2009; Sandberg, 2012b). Culturally rich and complex markets as well as sellers’ and buyers’ strategies mediate between the unofficial (and illegal) supply and the many different groups of users (Coomber & Moyle, 2014; Decorte & Potter, 2015; Werse et al., 2019). People who use cannabis also react to legislative changes and try to exploit the gaps allowing for personal use but not for supply (Belackova et al., 2015; Belackova & Wilkins, 2018), for example through Cannabis Social Clubs in Europe that attempt to use the decriminalization of personal use in coordinated associations that supply the drug to their members (Decorte et al., 2017). The cultures in which different cannabis markets are embedded also influence how they work economically (Sandberg, 2012b), and in this way cannabis markets, cannabis cultures and continuous legislative changes are closely intertwined.

Legislative, cultural and market changes intertwine with medical cannabis and the tensions between recreational users maintaining certain (sub)cultural meanings of the drugs, and medical activists, users and legislators advocating easier access to medical marijuana (Pedersen & Sandberg, 2013; Sznitman & Bretteville-Jensen, 2015). Moreover, with liberalization, medical cannabis and regulated access to cannabis become subject to the capitalist organization of supply, which interferes not only with the illicit markets and the organized crime structures but also with established and more harmless structures of supply that are involved in offering care and treatment (Subritzky et al., 2016). The introduction of regulations also meant the expansion of the so-called “big canna” industry, with all the contradictions of neoliberal capitalism, and the exploitation of the Global South (Bloomer, 2019; Vélez-Torres et al., 2021). Growing cannabis in Africa for example, has become increasingly profitable but is prone to discretionary policing amid “quasi-legality” (Carrier & Klantschnig, 2018; Nelson & Obot, 2020). Moreover, in some places, the human workforce, the soil and the water are all exploited, and traditional farming practices are ruined by Northern investors; some examples being Morocco and Jamaica where efficiency is prioritized over quality and control (Chouvy, 2019; Rychert et al., 2021). The principles of fair trade often seem to be missing (Kay et al., 2020) and the global cannabis industry fails to empower the traditional growers, protect their labor, or promote transparency or participatory and democratic control over cannabis production (Manu et al., 2021).

The digital sphere adds another dimension to the shifts in the global landscape of cannabis. The impact of the internet and social media arguably augment supply (Demant et al., 2019), both in the case of the dark and the surface web (Jardine & Lindner, 2020). Yet, the activity of vendors accounts for only a small part of cannabis-related online traffic. With global cannabis markets and cultures, the Internet acts as a broker of new trends and established forms of symbolism and narratives. They sometimes form “networked publics” of mainstream cannabis marketing that oftentimes go “below the radar” (Abidin, 2021). Moreover, the new regulation of cannabis markets has dramatically changed the online presence of the substance (Bakken & Harder, 2022). Influencers sponsored by the emerging cannabis industry, for example, change both the market and the cultural ideas associated with use.

Cannabis cultures

Cannabis currently undergoes what can be conceptualized as a “civilizing process” (Elias, 1978), being more and more socially regulated, and subjected to a great variety of powerful discourses and evolving ontologies (Søgaard & Lerkkanen, 2021). Yet, the “modernization” of cannabis has not removed the taboos, rituals, performances or mystery and aura associated with the drug. On the contrary, we would argue that cannabis research now, more than ever, is in need of a “cultural turn” (Alexander, 2021) to uncover the “cultural repertoires” (Lamont & Fleming, 2005), “cultural bricolages” (Levi-Strauss, 1966), or “cultural toolkits” (Swidler, 1986) that underpin the practices that guide both the use of cannabis and the informal and formal sanctioning of the drug.

Contemporary studies of culture tend to emphasize how human behavior and their norms, values and beliefs are intertwined (relationality), how power relations are inscribed in cultures (dissensus and consensus) and how weak boundaries facilitate symbolic and embodied transgressions. Culture thus encompasses the most important aspects of contemporary social life: interconnectedness, conflict and fluidity (Appadurai, 2004). Cannabis users are at the same time entangled in relations with local social networks, long-lasting local and global drug cultures, prohibitive legal systems and variably stigmatizing societies. Hence, depending on the context, cannabis users can be friends, customers, consumers, criminals, patients, dealers and/or caregivers.

The potential of “cannabis as ‘natural’ drug” narratives, medical cannabis ideology and “care for the self” narratives contrast with the stigmatization many users experience. Identities and reactions from society being at odds imply a constant need for identity management and handling outcomes of use (including therapy). Cannabis users also become consumers, with different rights or repercussions across various legal frameworks while still often participating in ambiguous illegal markets, frequently on blurry terms for example through social supply. When in regulated markets, they have to make consumer choices and become subject to marketing activity (Cormack & Cosgrave, 2021) where even packaging can highlight tensions among different cultural meanings associated with cannabis (Ventresca & Elliott, 2022).

Contemporary developments in cannabis cultures and markets result in many tensions as well (Kaplan, 1970; Owusu-Bempah & Luscombe, 2021). When use is criminalized, policing is often racialized or impacted by social class (Ahuja et al., 2022). There is also a gender dimension where women who use cannabis, in most societies, are more prone to experience stigma than men. In terms of age, older users can also experience harsher stigmatization, since their cannabis use is less expected. In sum, it is problematic to reify cannabis by treating it as a unidimensional substance. It is interwoven in complicated cultural relations, and this special issue serves as a reminder to drug scholars of the need to account for the cultural complexity when studying cannabis use and supply.

A global and diverse perspective

In assembling this special issue, we aimed at conceptual, topical and geographical diversity in order to map the variability of cannabis cultures and markets on a global scale. The issue accordingly covers the stigma, gendered use, comparisons, social worlds, symbolic boundaries, subcultures, identity work as well as digital, regulated and markets in transformation. Geographical diversity was difficult to obtain due to the domination by Western scholars in this field (as in most others in global academia), and many interesting research projects we engaged with from the Global South did not adhere to the stylistic tradition and form of academic publishing in the “Global North.” We made several efforts to encourage colleagues from non-Western countries to respond to the call, we engaged with their writing, and in some cases, we succeeded, but more often than not, we failed to produce a paper that met the rigid standards of the academic tradition this journal (for example) represents. Nevertheless, we ended up with 11 contributions, three from the US, and the rest from Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Nigeria, Poland, Latvia, Norway and Sweden, thus resulting in a relatively broad geographical representation. We also invited reviewers from outside Western academia to ensure that referees represent diverse perspectives.

In this special issue, the three articles from Eastern Europe and Africa illustrate the discrepancy between global tendencies of liberalization and normalization as well as the societies that are more conservative and stigmatizing regarding cannabis. The result is often intense processes of symbolic boundary drawing, social world cocooning and sustaining detached yet burgeoning cannabis cultures. A qualitative study from Latvia (Bebre, 2022) gives an insight into how cannabis stigma is played out in post-Soviet Riga. It describes how cultural codes regarding cannabis have changed following Communism, but also how cannabis users distanced themselves from the stereotypical “pothead” to avoid formal (punitive legislation) and informal (stigmatization) sanctions from a still highly cannabis-conservative Latvian society. Another study from Poland (Wanke et al., 2022) similarly explores the symbolic boundaries and social worlds of post-communist cannabis users. They detach themselves from conservative legal and social contexts, and the allegedly regressive Polish society, but interestingly also from more progressive Western legislations and cultures. Finally, a contribution from Nigeria (Ugwu & Dumbili, 2022) explores cannabis use and community forming in the province of Awka, elaborating on how users manage police extrajudicial practices and stigma. The study describes how cannabis users form communities or subcultures around the drug, which cushion the effects of social discrimination and persecution by corrupt law enforcement. Findings indicate that cannabis users suffer from both stigmatization and human rights abuses.

The grand narrative of cannabis liberalization is also challenged in Western countries. It is not a unilinear process, and decriminalization and/or normalization evoke their own contradictions and contesting stories, progressive or conservative. Such tensions shape users’ identities, as they do not uncritically absorb liberalizing paradigms, but selectively and creatively incorporate parts of political and moral narratives of cannabis into their own life situations and life stories. Two Nordic studies illustrate this dynamic: Research from Norway (Bilgrei et al., 2022) provides added insight into the role of political cannabis narratives and illustrates how adolescents make selective use of these to negotiate personal identity. The participants could, for example, draw on both progressive and conservative political identities in ways that reflected their political orientation and sense of identity. For many, views on cannabis thus do not exist as streamlined ideology or in isolation but must be seen as fragmented and reflecting key dimensions of personal identity and contemporary society. A Swedish study (Ekendahl & Karlsson, 2022) explores comparisons as a tool for identity formation and reveals similar complexity and narrative fragmentation. More specifically, they study what is compared when accounting for cannabis use. The results indicate that young people associate cannabis with freedom of choice, coping with demands of self-realization, achievement and happiness. They conclude that societal tendencies to frame cannabis as “forbidden fruit” enhance positive attitudes toward cannabis.

In processes of liberalization, legalization and normalization, gender and age are powerful mediators that need to be considered. For instance, there are important gender differences in perceptions and experiences of cannabis use. A paper in this special issue reveals that in Mexico, despite having significantly liberalized legislation of late, there still remains a persisting arrangement of rigid cultural patterns (Agoff et al., 2022). While men who use cannabis may experience fewer legal problems and encounters with the police, women who use cannabis are likely to continue to be culturally and socially stigmatized (see also Ugwu & Dumbili, 2022). Along with the articles from Africa and Eastern Europe, it contributes to nuancing and expanding contemporary research by including new contexts where, for example, gender differences can be more pronounced. Age problematizes and changes the societal perception of cannabis use as well. A study from the US (Staton et al., 2022) examined the influences and perceived outcomes of older adults’ cannabis use. They found that the cannabis subculture was only relevant for a few, while medical culture, physical age effects, and prior opioid use were more important. Although social categories are covered in contemporary cannabis literature, studies of their intersectionality, or how for example race, class, gender, age, sexual orientation, etc. intersect regarding cannabis use and cannabis culture is research deserving of further attention.

New regulatory changes unveil contradictions in regard to how cannabis is treated within neoliberal capitalism. Letting the big cannabis industry into an established culture of small-scale growers influences and changes grassroots social movements and cannabis cultures. Relatedly, another study from the US reveals some of the shortcomings and tensions within Michigan’s newly regulated medical cannabis market (Reid, 2022). The research demonstrates and discusses some of the problems that arose during this process with particular attention to how the reforms affected medical cannabis patients in the state. The study illustrates the benefits of critically analyzing the effects of cannabis liberalization, while also taking into account the influence of culture. Similarly, cannabis supply and cultures are interwoven with the developments in the digital sphere and in new markets. Cannabis features on the surface web and the users meander or disregard the risks associated with use, referring to the established cannabis cultural meanings. A study from Australia (Childs et al., 2022) explores the digital modality found in LeafedOut, a popular internet website, that provides a conduit for local cannabis exchanges. They found that actors neutralized the perceived risks of drug supply and developed new forms of drug market trust using this surface web platform.

The articles in this special issue mentioned above are all firmly embedded in specific societal or national contexts. Our issue also includes two more general papers, drawing on examples from multiple settings and countries. The emergence of synthetic cannabinoids is another case of unsolicited consequences of the prohibitionist and punitive policies. Being criminalized, heavily stigmatized, and as a result of the drive for increased potency, constantly riskier for the vulnerable populations, the synthetic cannabinoids can be seen as a twisted co-produced result of assemblage of meanings associated with cannabis cultures and the realms of the drug scene combining of illegal markets and questionable policies. Hutton (2022) seeks to explore shifting intoxications with synthetic cannabinoids, such as “spice,” and discusses debates about stigma and the co-production of knowledge about drugs and their users. Finally, Wheeldon (2022) argues that criminology has a lot to offer cannabis research and vice versa. The study gives another critical insight into the transforming landscape of cannabis. Calling for cannabis criminology, the authors deconstruct “illusory reforms” that reproduce existing inequalities by reinforcing stigma through prohibitionist thinking. It results in racialized policing, coercive treatment and exploitation of the Global South.

Conclusion

This special issue was conceived as part of the Erasmus + project "Drug Abuse Prevention for Youth” (DAPY) co-funded by the Turkish National Agency and the European Union and involving institutions and researchers from Turkey, Norway, Poland and Portugal. In addition to academic outputs, such as this special issue, the aim of the project was to raise awareness among young people and to prevent drug use by creating a training module and short films (see dapy.org). Through workshops, academic meetings and attempts at co-creating material that can inform current or potential cannabis users about the drug, it soon became clear to us that cannabis was not one thing. Rather, it differed significantly depending upon national, cultural, and legislative contexts – as well as with age, gender, ethnicity, etc. Discussing how to best inform young people about cannabis, we constantly ended up in debates that revealed how we spoke and where we spoke from, as well as our positioning in different societal, cultural and cannabis market contexts. It is some of the insights from these discussions that we hope to bring with us into this special issue.

The studies in this special issue originate from countries where liberalization of markets and cultural appropriation of cannabis is at very different stages. With cannabis as a source of strong cultural meanings, all of them involve stigma and tensions connected to shifting legal status. The values and meanings associated with cannabis constantly relate to the dynamically changing cannabis landscape, both locally and globally. The differences between various countries, and within them—resulting from divergent cultures, cannabis markets and social and institutional adaptation to the liberalization of cannabis, induce inequalities and conflict. New drug trends and cultures petrify some while driving others towards creating new forms of stability and cultural homology, as seen for example in the case of people using cannabis in Nigeria, Latvia and Poland in this special issue. Despite changes, people who use cannabis often find themselves in vulnerable positions, prone to fluid and unpredictable changes, and new subtle (or less subtle) forms of stigmatization and repression.

Many of the Western assumptions about how youth define cannabis are inaccurate or erroneous for cultural contexts where drugs are highly tabooed; coming of age is characterized by drastically gendered trajectories, and families mediate the potential stigma of drug use extensively. With increasingly interconnected and multicultural societies, any application of cannabis scholarship must account for the nature of the diverse and different cultural appropriations of cannabis (Fischer et al., 2022). With this special issue, we call for critical cannabis studies from a variety of positions and contexts. Cannabis may be the least stigmatized of the illicit drugs, but it heralds changes in moral, legal and interactional orders of societies, residually reproducing stigma and injustice, and hence represents a fascinating case for studying both continuity and change.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This Editorial and the Editors’ work on the special issue was part of the project “DAPY: Drug Abuse Prevention for Youth” (2019-3-TR01-KA205-079609). The European Commission's support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents, which reflect the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.