Free party, counterculture, drug uses, harm reduction, repressive measures

This article offers a synthesis of 20 years of observations made at festive events by the observation system Recent Trends and New Drugs (TREND). The first part is devoted to free-parties and the effects of the policy of repression of these types of parties on their form, their organization, and the evolution of drug use as well as the presence of actors in harm reduction. If the permissive nature of free-party drug use is observed, it is accompanied by social limitations expressed by partygoers towards certain uses or substances. In counterpoint, the second part reports on observations in festive commercial places which integrate techno music in their programming (festivals, nightclubs, bars, clubs, etc.), pointing to a contemporary contradiction: despite the limitations of the repression of events such as free-parties, harm reduction has been able to develop there. Paradoxically, and despite their legal framework, this has been less the case in legal institutions and events.