Recommended Reading

While I was researching for The Candy Machine: How Cocaine Took Over The World, I put together this list of interesting looking books. I didn't find time to read many of them, but this list might point the way for people wanting to find out more about various aspects of 'the life of cocaine' after reading The Candy Machine. Testimonies collected in support of my research can be read here.

 

I have highlighted in bold the books that I particularly enjoyed:

 

General Books about Cocaine

Cocaine: An Annotated Bibliography
Carlton E. Turner, University of Mississippi 1988

 

White Mischief: A Cultural History of Cocaine
Tim Madge, Mainstream 2001

 

The Pursuit of Oblivion: A Global History of Narcotics
R. Davenport-Hines, London: Phoenix 2004

 

Forces of Habit: Drugs and the Making of the Modern World
Courtwright, David T, Harvard University Press 2001

 

The Steel Drug: Cocaine and Crack in Perspective
Patricia Erickson, Lexington 1994

 

The Great Issues of Drug Policy
eds. Trebach and Zeese, Drug Policy Foundation 1990

 

The Gentlemen's Club: International Control of Drugs and Alcohol
Bruun, Kettil, Lynn Pan and Ingemar Rexed, University of Chicago 1975

 

Criminology
S. Barkan, Prentice Hall 1997


The History of Cocaine

Freud and Cocaine: The Freudian Fallacy
E.M. Thornton, Blond and Briggs 1983

 

Cocaine: Global Histories
Ed. Paul Gootenberg, Routledge 1999

 

Prohibition: 13 Years That Changed America
Edward Behr (on video)

 

Temperance and Racism: John Bull, Johnny Reb and the Good Templars
David Fahey

 

Deliver US From Evil: An Interpretation of American Prohibition
Norman H. Clark, Norton 1976

 

The United States and International Drug Control: 1909–1997
Dave Bewley Taylor, Pinter 1999 & Continuum 2001

 

Emperors of Dreams: Drugs in the Nineteenth Century
Mike Jay, Dedalus Press 2005

 

Drugs in America: A Social History 1800-1980
H.W. Morgan, Syracuse University Press 1981

 

Drugs and the Media

Crack in America: Demon Drugs and Social Justice
Eds. Craig Reinarman and Harry Levine, Uni. Of California Press 1997

 

Cracked Coverage: TV News, The Anti-Cocaine Crusade and The Reagan Legacy
Jimmie Lynn Reeves and Richard Campbell, Duke University Press 1994

 

Drug Wars: The Political Economy of Narcotics
Curtis Marez, Uni of Minnesota Press 2004

 

Synthetic Panics: The Symbolic Politics of Designer Drugs
Philip Jenkins, NYU Press 1999

 

My Cocaine Museum
Michael Taussig, University of Chicago Press 2004

 

Drug Taking, Drug Users, Addiction

Drug, Set and Setting: The Basis For Controlled Intoxicant Use
Norman Zinberg, Yale University Press 1984

 

Cocaine and Crack: Supply and Use
Ed. Bean, Philip T., New York: St. Martin's Press 1993

 

Crack: The Broken Promise
Allen and Jekel, Macmillan 1991

 

Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo
M. Douglas, Routledge 1978

 

Crack and Cocaine
David Browne, F.Watts 1987

 

Cocaine Changes: The Experience of Using and Quitting
Waldorf, Reinarman and Murphy, Temple University Press 1991

 

The Psychology of Addiction
M. McMurran, Taylor and Francis 1994

 

Seductions of Crime: Moral and Sensual Attractions of Doing Evil
Jack Katz, Basic Books 1988

 

The Disreputable Pleasures
JL Hagan, McGraw-Hill Ryerson 1991

 

Moral Panics: The Social Construction of Deviance
Goode and Nachman, Blackwell 1994

 

The Cult of Pharmacology
Richard Degrandpre, Duke University Press 2006

 

The Medicine Society
Paul Scriven, Michigan State University Press 1992

 

Cultural Politics and Social Movements
Eds. Darnovsky, Epstein, and Flacks, Temple University Press 1995
(for Craig Reinarmann's Chapter: 'The 12-Step Movement and Advanced Capitalist Culture:Notes on the Politics of Self-Control in Postmodernity')

 

The Myth of Addiction
John Booth Davies (he teaches at the University of Strathclyde)

 

Help At Any Cost: How the Troubled-Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids
Maia Szalavitz, Riverhead 2006

 

The Meaning of Addiction: Compulsive Behaviour and It's Interpretation
Stanton Peele, Lexington Books 1985

 

Doing Coke: An Ethnography of Cocaine Users and Sellers
Waldorf, Drug Abuse Council 1977

 

Hooked: Five Addicts Challenge our Misguided Rehab System
Lonny Shavelson, New Press 2001

 

The Taming of Cocaine: cocaine use in European and American cities
Tom Decorte, VUB University Press 2000

 

Addiction
D. Marteau, Quay Books 2001

 

Buying and Selling Drugs in the US

The Gang
FM Thrasher, Uni of Chicago Press 1927

 

In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio
P.I. Bourgeois, Cambridge University Press 1995

 

Dealing Crack: The Social World of Street Corner Dealing
Bruce Jacobs, Northeastern University Press 1999

 

Disorganized Crime: The Economics of the Visible Hand
Peter Reuter, MIT Press 1983

 

The Cocaine Kids: The Inside Story of a Teenage Drug Ring
Terry Williams, Bloomsbury 1990

 

Cocaine True, Cocaine Blue (photos taken in Red Hook, Philly and East NY)
Eugene Richards, Aperture 1994

 

Illicit: How Smugglers, Traffickers and Copycats are Hijacking the Global Economy
Moises Naim, Doubleday 2005

 

Code of the Street: Decency, Violence and The Moral Life of The Inner City
E. Anderson, Norton 1999

 

The Introduction of Crack Cocaine and The Rise in Urban Crime Rates
Grogger and Willis, National Bureau of Economic Research 1998

 

Street Justice: Retaliation in the Criminal Underworld
Bruce Jacobs, Cambridge University Press 2006

 

Street Wars: Gangs and the Future of Violence
Tom Hayden, New Press 2005

 

In the Shadow of the White House: Drugs, Death and Redemption on the Streets of the Nation's Capital
M. Tidwell, Prima Publishing 1992

 

The Culture of Drugs in the Black Community
Nobles, Goddard, Cavil and George, Institute for the Advanced Study of Black Family Life and Culture 1987

 

Gangsta: Merchandising the Rhymes of Violence
R. Ro, St. Martins Press 1996

 

The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighbourhood
D. Simon and E. Burns, Broadway 1997

 

Race, Society and Prisons in the US

Invisible Punishment: The Collateral Consequences of Mass Imprisonment
Eds. Mauer and Chesney-Lind, New Press 2004

 

Punishment and Democracy: Essays on the Prison Industrial Complex
Angela Davis, New York: Pantheon Press forthcoming

 

The Many Colours of Crime: Inequalities of Race, Ethnicity and Crime in America
Eds. Peterson, Krivo and Hagan, NYU Press 2006

 

Pipe Dream Blues: Racism and the War on Drugs
Clarence Lusane, South End Press 1991

 

Golden Gulag: Prisons, Surplus, Crisis and Opposition in Globalizing California
Ruth Gilmore, University of California Press 2006

 

Race to Incarcerate
Mark Mauer, New Press 2006

 

Prison Nation: The Warehousing of America's Poor
Eds. Wright and Herivel, Routledge 2003


Are Prisons Obsolete?
Angela Davis, Seven Stories Press 2003

 

Two Nations: Black and White, Separate, Hostile, Unequal
Andrew Hacker, Scribners 1992

 

The Undeserving Poor
Michael Katz, Pantheon 1989

 

Blacks in the White Establishment: A Study of Race and Class in America
Zweigenhaft and Domhoff, Yale University Press 1991

 

Drug Policy and the Decline of American Cities
Sam Staley, Transaction 1992

 

Consequences of Growing Up Poor
GJ Duncan and J. Brooks-Gunn, Russell Sage Foundation 1997

 

Young, Black and Male in America: An Endangered Species
J.T. Gibbs, Auburn House 1988

 

The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, The Under Class and Public Policy
W.J. Wilson, University Of Chicago Press 1987

 

The Myth of Black Progress
Alphonso Pinkney, Cambridge University Press 1984

 

Caste and Class in a Southern Town
John Dollard, New York 1957 ('a sociological Gulliver's Travels')

 

An American Dilemma
Gunnar Myrdal, New York 1964

 

Schooling in Capitalist America
Bowles and Gintis, Basic Books 1977

 

Tally's Corner: A Study of Negro Streetcorner Men
E. Liebow, Little and Brown 1967

 

Getting Paid
M. Sullivan, Rutgers University Press 1989

 

Homeboys: gangs, drugs and prison in the barrios of Los Angeles
Joan Moore, Temple University Press 1978

 

Code of the Street: Decency, Violence and The Moral Life of The Inner City
E. Anderson, Norton 1999

 

Crime Control as Industry
Nils Christie, Routledge 1994

 

Malign Neglect: Race, Crime and Punishment in America
Tonry, Oxford 1995

 

No Equal Justice: Race and Class in the US Criminal Justice System
David Cole, New Press 1999

 

Manchild in the Promised Land
C. Brown, Macmillan 1965

 

All God's Children: The Bosket Family and the American Tradition of Violence
F. Butterfield, Knopf 1995

 

All God's Children Need Travelling Shoes
Maya Angelou, London 1987

 

My Soul is Rested: Movement Days in the Deep South Remembered
Howard Raines, Penguin 1983

 

Who Needs the Negro?
Sidney Wilhelm, Schenkman 1970

 

Cocaine in the Caribbean & Central America

Cocaine and Heroin Trafficking in The Caribbean:
the case of Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and Guyana
Daurius Figueira, iUniverse 2004

 

Ruthless: The Global Rise of The Yardies
G. Small, Warner Books 1995

 

Born Fi Dead: A Journey Through The Jamaican Posse Underworld
Laurie Gunst, Canongate 2003

 

The Political Economy of Drugs in The Caribbean
I.L.Griffith (ed.), Macmillan 2000

 

Cocaine Politics: Drugs, Armies, and The CIA in Central America
Peter Dale Scott and Jonathan Marshall, University of California Press 1998

 

Dark Alliance: The CIA, The Contras and The Crack Cocaine Explosion
Gary Webb, Turnaround 1988

 

The Politics of Heroin in South East Asia
Alfred McCoy, University of Wisconsin-Madison 1972

 

The Global Economy and State Power
(for the chapter by Andreas 'When Policies Collide: Market Reform, Market Prohibition and The Narcotization of The Mexican Economy')
eds. Richard Friman and Peter Andreas, Roman and Littlefield 1999

 

El Narcotraficante:
Narco-corridos and The Construction of a Cultural Persona on The US-Mexico Border
Mark Cameron Edberg, University of Texas Press 2004

 

True Tales From Another Mexico
Sam Quinones, University of New Mexico Press 2001

 

Powderburns
Celerino Castillo III, Mosaic 1994

 

Puro Border: Dispatches, Snapshots & Graffiti From La Frontera
ed. Luis Humberto Crosthwaite, John William Byrd, and Bobby Byrd, Cinco Puntos Press 2003

 

El Zar de la Droga: La Vida de un Narcotraficante Mexicano
Terrence Poppa

 

Colombia and US Foreign Policy

La Economia Colombiana Tras 25 Anos de Narcotrafico
Ricardo Rocha Garcia, Siglo del Hombre 2000

 

No Nacimos Pa' Semilla
Alonso Salazar, Planeta 2001

 

Drogas y Narcotrafico en Colombia
Alonso Salazar, Planeta 2001

 

Drugs and Democracy in Latin America: The Impact of US Policy
Youngers and Rosin, Lynne Rienner 2004

 

US Foreign Policy and The War on Drugs
Cornelius Friesendorf, Routledge 2006

 

More Terrible Than Death: Massacres, Drugs and America's War in Colombia
Robin Kirk, Public Affairs 2003

From Silver to Cocaine: Latin American Commodity Chains and The Building of The World Economy 1500-2000


eds. Toik, Marichal and Frank, Duke University Press 2006

 

Beneath The United States: A History of US Policy Towards Latin America
Lars Schoultz, Harvard University Press 1998

 

Driven by Drugs: US Policy Toward Colombia
Russell Crandell, Lynne Rienner 2002

 

Political Economy and Illegal Drugs in Colombia
Francisco Thoumi, Lynne Rienner 1995

 

Loyal Soldiers in The Cocaine Kingdom: Tales of Drugs, Mules and Gunmen
Alfredo Molano, Colombia University Press 2004

 

The Andes in Focus
Ed. Russell Crandall, Lynne Rienner 2005

 

Walking Ghosts
Steven Dudley, Routledge 2004

 

Systems of Violence: Political Economy of War and Peace in Colombia
Nazih Richani, State University of New York Press 2001

 

Latin America After Neo-Liberalism
eds. Hershberg and Rosen, New Press 2006

 

Colombia: Fragmented Land, Divided Society
Safford and Palacios, Oxford University Press 2002

 

Colombia: Inside The Labyrinth
Jenny Pearce, LAB Books 1990

 

Los Jinetes de la Cocaina
Fabio Castillo, Documentos Periodisticos, Bogota 1988

 

Hoja, Pasta, Polvo y Roca: El Consumo de Los Derivados de La Coca
Aurelio Diaz, Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona 1998

 

Cocaine: White Gold Rush in Peru
E. Morales, Uni. Of Arizona Press 1989

 

Colonizacion, Coca y Guerrilla
Jaime Eduardo Jaramillo, Universidad Nacional de Bogota 1986

 

Entre el Estado y la Guerrilla: Identidad y Ciudadania en El Movimiento de Los Campesinos Cocaleros Del Putumayo
Maria Clemencia Ramirez, Universidad Nacional Bogota 2001

 

Coca-Cola: Historia, Manejo Politico y Mafia de La Cocaine
Mario Arango & Jorge Child, Dos Mundos Bogota 1986

 

Narcotrafico: Imperio de La Cocaine
Mario Arango & Jorge Child, Percepcion Medellin 1984

 

Los Condenados de La Coca, El Manejo Politico de La Droga
Mario Arango, Editorial Arango 1985

 

Lehder: El Hombre
Jorge Eliecer Orozco, Plaza and Janes 1987

 

Death Beat: A Colombian Journalist's Life Inside The Cocaine Wars
Maria Jimena Duzan, Harper Collins 1994

 

Chemical Warfare in Colombia: The Costs of Coca Fumigation
Hugh O'Shaughnessy and Sue Branford, LAB 2005

 

Rehenes de La Mafia
Edgar Torres and Armando Sarmiento, Bogota: Intermedio Editores 199

 

Questioning the War on Drugs

Our Right to Drugs: The Case for a Free Market
Thomas Szasz, Syracuse University Press 1996

 

Ceremonial Chemistry: The Ritual Persecution of Drugs, Addicts, and Pushers.
Thomas Szasz, Holmes Beach FL: Learning Publications 1985 (1974)

 

Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals
John Gray, Granta Books 2002

 

Winning the War on Drugs: To Legislate or Not?
R. Stevenson, Institute for Economic Affairs 1994

 

Drug War Heresies: Learning from Other Places, Times and Vices
Peter Reuter and Robert MacCoun, Cambridge University Press 2001

 

An Unwinnable War Against Drugs: The Politics of Decriminalization
Eds. J. Matthews, T. Carney, Pluto Press: Sydney 1991

 

The American Disease: Origins of Narcotics Control
David Musto, Yale University Press 1973

 

The Drug Legalization Debate
James Inciardi, Sage 1999

 

Confronting Drug Policy
eds. Ronald Bayer and Gerald Oppenheimer, Cambridge University Press 1993

 

Against Excess
Mark Kleiman, Basic Books 1992

 

The Cocaine Crises
D.F. Allen, Plenum 1987

 

Drug Crazy, How We Got Into This Mess And How We Can Get Out
Mike Gray, Routledge 2003

 

Why Our Drugs Laws Have Failed and What We Can Do About It
James Gray, Temple Uni. Press 2001

 

Between Politics and Reason: The Drug Legalisation Debate
Erich Goode, St. Martins 1997

 

The Legislation of Morality
Troy Duster, Free Press 1970

 

Policing and the War on Drugs

Traffickers: Drug Markets and Law Enforcement
Dorn, Murji and South, Routledge 1992

 

Drug Policy and The Decline of American Cities
Sam Staley, Transaction 1992

 

Snow Job: The War Against International Drug Trafficking
Jack Riley, Transaction 1996

 

Crack and The Evolution of Anti-Drug Policy
S. Belenko, Greenwood Press 1993

 

The Strength of The Wolf:
The Secret History of America's War on Drugs
Douglas Valentine

 

DEA: The War Against Drugs
Jessica de Grazia, BBC Books 1991

 

The Cocaine Wars
Paul Eddy, Century 1988

 

Without a Badge: Undercover in The World's Deadliest Criminal Organizations
Jerry Speziale with Mark Seal, Arrow 2004

 

Political and Financial Corruption

Big Deal: Politics of The Illicit Drugs Business
Henman and Lewis, Pluto Press 1985

 

Drugs Crime and Corruption: Thinking The Unthinkable
Richard Clutterbuck, NYU Press 1995

 

Chasing Dirty Money: The Fight Against Money Laundering
Peter Reuter and Edwin Truman, Institute for International Economics 2004

 

The White Labyrinth: Cocaine and Political Power
Renssalaer Lee, Transaction 1989

 

The Underground Empire: Where Crime and Justice Embrace
James Mills, Doubleday 1996

 

Drug Trafficking in The Americas
(eds)Bruce Bagley and W.O. Walker, Transaction 1994

 

The Fix
Michael Massing, University of California Press 2000

 

Whitewash: Pablo Escobar and The Drug Wars
Simon Strong, Macmillan 1995

 

Whiteout: The CIA, Drugs and The Press
Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, 1998

 

The Business of Drugs
Mary Cooper, Bombay: Popular Prakashan 1993

 

Drugs and Money: Laundering Latin America's Cocaine Dollars
Robert Grosse, Praegar 2001

 

The Politics of Organised Crime and The Organised Crime of Politics: A Study in Criminal Power
Alfredo Schulte Bockholt, Lexington 2006

 

Other Countries' Perspectives

Heroin and Crack Cocaine Markets in Deprived Areas
Andrew Wilson, Centre for the Analysis of Social Exclusion, LSE 2002

 

Crack Cocaine and Drugs: Crime Careers
Howard Parker, Uni of Manchester 1996

 

Trafficking Cocaine: Colombian Drug Entrepreneurs in The Netherlands
D. Zaitch, Kluwer Law International,The Hague 2002

 

Powder Wars: The Supergrass Who Brought Down Britain's Biggest Drug Dealers
(about Paul Grimes, former gangster of Liverpool's Hole in the Wall gang)
Graham Johnson, Mainstream 2005

 

Community-led Innovation in Addressing the Problems Caused by Crack Cocaine in London
Kate Barker, GLA 2004 (Greater London Alcohol and Drug Alliance)

 

Miscellaneous

The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life
E. Goffman, Doubleday 1959

 

The Consequences of Modernity
Anthony Gidden, Polity Press 1990

 

The Romantic Ethic and The Spirit of Modern Consumerism
Colin Campbell, Blackwell 1987

 

All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of Modernity
Marshall Berman, Verso 1983

 

The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism
Daniel Bell, Harper Torch Books 1976

 

Europe and The People Without History
E. Wolf, University of California Press 1982

 

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
T.S. Kuhn, University of Chicago Press 1962

 

Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance
James Scott, Yale University Press 1985

Transparency and Conspiracy: Ethnographies of Suspicion in the New World Order
H.West and T. Sanders, Duke University Press 2003

 

American Nervousness, 1903: An Anecdotal History
Tom Lutz, Cornell University Press 1991

 

The Poetics and Politics of Transgression
Stallybrass and White, Methuen 1986