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What is the place of treatment in a holistic systems approach to reducing drugs harm?
Robert Rae, Scotland's Futures Forum; Mike McCarron, KDOS Steering Group; Tony Hodgson, International Futures Forum
Abstract
The workshop will present, test and welcome ideas to develop through discussion with participants a holistic Systems Mapping Approach created by Scotland's Futures Forum (SFF) year long study on how to reduce substance use harms in Scotland by half by 2025.
The current banking crisis is largely due to regulators, politicians and customers focusing on the particular in a very complex world and missing big economic realities. Could the same be true of our approach to drug problems? If so, what are we missing? The SFF Systems Map describes the Scottish context of 2008 with a view to informing policy priorities to re-create a map for 2025 reducing by half the level of substance use harms. The focus on drug treatment is an important but not the only dimension in an holistic approach so the contributions and limitations of drug treatment need to be understood. Systems thinking can help bring more coherence to our understanding of the interactions going on in complex or "messy" problems. The SFF approach maps global governance as well as local treatment, science as well as culture, public health as well as criminal justice - and central to all is the lived experience of our communities. A key question is what is the best balance of policy responses across all these domains?
The views of workshop participants about the systems approach and these questions will be a valuable contribution to work currently underway to develop this analysis.
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Biographies
Robert Rae has a background working as a civil servant in Scotland. He was involved in setting up the Scottish Parliament think tank, Scotland’s Futures Forum, of which he is the first Director.
Mike McCarron has worked in Local Government Social Work Services in Scotland and latterly with local and national DAT strategies.
Tony Hodgson is a consultant in the theory and application of systems analysis and is member of the International Futures Forum based in Scotland.
All three were centrally involved in the year long SSF Project "Fresh Perspectives on Alcohol and Drugs" which used an innovative systems mapping approach in its published report of 2008 (www.scotlandfutureforum.org).
All three are currently members of the KDOS Institute Steering Group, which has been set up to take forward the work published by the SFF Project and by the Royal Society of Arts Commission on Illegal Drugs.
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