A territorialidade das Associações Canábicas no Paraná

Abstract

Interest in cannabis is rising in Brazil and worldwide. Several reasons can be indicated as drivers of this process: the experience with drug decriminalization in some countries in the second half of the twentieth century and the discovery of the properties of medicinal cannabis are some of those that may have awakened society's attention on this plant. Many issues were put in check, such as the actual consequences of smoking marijuana, and, currently, it is also questioned to what extent these arguments are valid to justify its prohibition, when compared to the damage caused by criminalization or by the consumption of other drugs, legal and illegal. However, even though this is a topic of growing debate among the social sciences, there are few studies that investigate the geographies of cannabis. Defining a methodology for identifying the Cannabis Associations addressed in this dissertation requires understanding the difficulties surrounding the study of cannabis in geographical science. The prohibition of cannabis and the stigmatization that this plant suffered throughout the 20th century prevented and repelled scientific initiatives to study it, its spatial problematization becomes counterintuitive when dealing with a plant that, by law, should not exist. On the other hand, the Cannabis Associations that emerged in Brazil and in the world at the turn of the second to the third millennium present themselves as a potential terrain for spatial research, easily located. Since this model usually arises as a form of claiming the rights of recreational and medicinal users, the territory can be a key category of analysis to understand the spatiality of the phenomenon. Estimates point out that in Brazil there are already about 100 active Cannabis Associations, and, through this work, 13 of them were identified in the state of Paraná. Besides bringing cannabis studies closer to geography, studying Cannabis Associations is also of interest to other areas of knowledge, not yet introduced in geographic science, which could also contribute to the understanding of the phenomenon and the debate on the positive and negative consequences when Associations present themselves as an alternative model of drug policies. Thus, this dissertation has as its main objective to understand the territoriality of the active Cannabis Associations in Paraná. To this end, we sought to contextualize them within a geography of cannabis; define a category of territorial analysis for the phenomenon; identify the Associations present in the state; interview institutional representatives and associates; and finally, characterize the territoriality of the Cannabis Associations in Paraná. Despite presenting considerations about the territoriality of the Cannabis Associations located in Paraná, a general consideration about the territoriality of the Cannabis Association model as a whole still remains to be built by studying other contexts where such Associations may be identified. It is hoped that the present work will also motivate other researchers, especially in the area of geography, to investigate about cannabis and Cannabis Associations.