Creating a Drug Czar: A Study of Political Rationality and Symbolic Politics

Abstract

Many prominent criminal justice experts have characterized as irrational the federal anti-crime/anti-drug legislation enacted during the last two decades. Among the drug provisions repeatedly considered and sometimes enacted by Congress were proposals to establish a drug czar. To gain insight into the political rationality underlying Congress's persistent efforts to establish a drug czar, this article examines these attempts in the context of symbolic politics — what political acts mean to the public — and political institutions. Specifically, it explores how Congressional efforts to enact a drug czar reflect Congress' need to reassure the public and how a political structure can serve a symbolic threat/reassurance function of criminal law.