Rivera–Santana do Livramento: Regulation of Cannabis on the “Border of Peace”

Abstract

Areas of interaction and heterogeneity, of continuities and conflicts are shaped within the political limits of the Nation-State and border areas. In social imagery, these spaces are conceived as being very irregular, where substances called “drugs” circulate, along with different kinds of peoples, relationships and goods. This study approaches issues of borders, circulation and tensions by studying disputes of meaning surrounding the use of cannabis as expressed in Uruguayan regulation of this substance in the border area of Rivera (Uruguay) and Santana do Livramento (Brazil). This border is characterized by a dense web of social interactions which transcend political limits. Although historically characterized as a “border of peace”, this particular border is not free of tension and dispute. It is a space of continuities and conflicts marked by two national states with opposite regulations to the use of “drugs”. Thus, meaning generated around the consumption of cannabis and its market regulation are part of this border’s daily life, endowing it with particular dynamics and circulation which configure the way that people construct and experience the border.