Heavy Traffic: The Global Drug Trade in Historical Perspective (Roots of Contemporary Issues)

Growing directly out of the experiences of a team of historians at Washington State University who designed a new foundational course for WSUs common requirements the Roots of Contemporary Issues series is built on the premise that students will be better at facing current and future challenges no matter their major or career path if they are capable of addressing controversial and pressing issues in mature reasoned ways using evidence critical thinking and clear written and oral communication skills. To help students achieve these goals each title in the Roots of Contemporary Issues series argues that we need both a historical understanding and an appreciation of the ways in which humans have been interconnected with places around the world for decades and even centuries. Much of the worlds politics revolve around questions about the development of the international market for drugs; the roles merchants government officials and drug manufacturers played in shaping this market over time and space; and the process of globalization. There are no easy answers to these questions but the decisions that all of us make about them will have tremendous consequences for individuals and for the planet in the future. Heavy Traffic helps students to understand globalization not as an inevitable or natural process but instead as one that is created by and responds to a variety of human motivations. Examining the international trade in coffee alcohol opium heroin and cocaine which have had a significant impact on economies and societies in countries around the world it offers insight into globalization as a historical process thereby helping to make sense of todays interconnected world where products grown or produced in only a handful of places circulate widely with varying impacts on local populations.