Synopses & Reviews
Cannabis Britannica explores the historical origins of the UK's legislation and regulations on cannabis preparations before 1928. In 2003 the role of government in the regulation of cannabis is as hotly debated as it was a century ago. It draws on published and unpublished sources from the seventeenth century onwards from archives in the UK and India to show how the history of cannabis and the British before the twentieth century was bound up with imperialism. In this lively study James Mills explores the historical background of cannabis legislation, arguing that the drive towards prohibition grew out of the politics of empire rather than scientific or rational assessment of the drug's use and effects. The book is the first full history of the origins of the moments when cannabis first became subjected to laws and regulations in Britain.
Review
"This study is built upon a tremendous research effort, one which easily surpasses anything heretofore written on the subject. Indeed, this book should quickly become one of the standard historical references on cannabis."--Journal of Social History
"Mills has made an important contribution in resurrecting the information in the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission Report and in bringing to light again the extensive nineteenth-century medical and scientific literature on cannabis.... One would hope that future debates on the issue of cannabis will be informed by his research."--American Historical Review
Review
"James Mills' study of British attitudes and policies toward cannabis between 1800 and 1928 is a most welcome addition to the growing historiography of the social, economic and political significance of psychoactive substances."-- Business History Review
Synopsis
Cannabis Britannica explores the historical origins of the UK's legislation and regulations on cannabis preparations before 1928. It draws on published and unpublished sources from the seventeenth century onwards from archives in the UK and India to show how the history of cannabis and the British before the twentieth century was bound up with imperialism. James Mills argues that until the 19s, most of the information and experience gathered by British sources were drawn from colonial contexts as imperial administrators governed and observed populations where use of cannabis was extensive and established. This is most obvious in the 189s when British anti-opium campaigners in the House of Commons seized on the issue of Government of India excise duties on the cannabis trade in Asia in order to open up another front in their attacks on imperial administration. The result was that cannabis preparations became a matter of concern in Parliament which accordingly established the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission. The story in the twentieth century is of the momentum behind moves to include cannabis substances in domestic law and in international treaties. The latter was a matter of the diplomatic politics of imperialism, as Britain sought to defend its cannabis revenues in India against American and Egyptian interests. The domestic story focuses on the coming together of the police, the media, and the pharmaceutical industry to form misunderstandings of cannabis that forced it onto the Poisons Schedule despite the misgivings of the Home Office and of key medical professionals. The book is the first full history of the origins of the moments when cannabis first became subjected to laws and regulations in Britain.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. 'Dr O'Shaughnessy appears to have made some experiments with charas': Ancient Knowledge and Victorian Science
3. 'From the old records of the Ganja Supervisor's Office': Smuggling, Trade, and Taxation in the Ganja Mahal of the 1860s
4. 'The Sikh who killed the Reverend was a known bhang drinker': Murder, Madness, and Drugs in the Empire in the 1870s
5. 'The Lunatic Asylums of India are filled with ganja smokers': Ganja in Parliament 1891-1894
6. 'The inferior ganja of Western India has found its way to the London market': International Trade and Imperial Experiences 1894-1925
7. 'An allusion was made to hemp in the notes appended to the Hague Opium Convention': the League of Nations and British Legislation 1925-1928
8. Conclusion: Government Scares, Shaky Science, and the Imperial History of Cannabis
Bibliography
Index