By the late 1980s, Colombia had become the worlds leading producer and exporter of cocaine, as well as the most important coca growing country in the Andes. In the context of the War on Drugs, U.S. aid to the country increased significantly during this period, and by 1991, Colombia was the leading recipient of U.S. aid in Latin America. Despite the increase in U.S. resources, Colombias military suffered a series of important defeats to prominent guerilla groups, which were regarded as major players in the cocaine trade, as well as a serious threat to political stability in the country. In response, a U.S. and Colombian partnership known as Plan Colombia (20002005) was initiated, and in accordance with the plan, more coca was eradicated in Colombia than anywhere else in the world. In this context, this thesis asks, what are the unintended consequences of coca eradication as they pertain to Plan Colombia To answer this question, this thesis elucidates the fundamental linkages between mainstream and deviant globalization and the unintended consequences of supply-side drug control efforts, such as an eradication policy. It also illuminates how the most important global economic transformations of the past 40 years have profoundly and continuously undermined U.S. efforts to eradicate coca, and how strategies that continue to discount the role of globalization (deviant or otherwise) will likely play out in the future.
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