An overview of half a century of drug prohibition and consumption in France, from the 1960s to the present day

This article provides an overview of half a century of drug addiction in French society. It begins by examining counterculture and the “social scourge” threatening youth (1966–1973), followed by the entrenchment and diversification of the problem (1973–1980), the invisible massification (1980–1986), the AIDS years with the tension between the war on drugs and harm reduction (1986–1994), and the resulting major paradigm shift in health policy (1994–2002), before concluding on the maintenance of the restrictive framework of the war on drugs (2002–2010s).