Sharp, Dee2022-06-292022-06-2920222022-06-29http://hdl.handle.net/1828/14008This project uses Carrol Bacchi’s post-structuralist framework “What’s the Problem Represented to be?” (also known as a WPR approach) to conduct a critical policy analysis of the Government of British Columbia’s October 2021 request to Health Canada to decriminalize personal possession of illicit substances. Through a WPR approach, I place this public policy into a wider political context and understand how substance use continues to be problematized and regulated by the state. I evaluate how the policy challenges and/or reifies prohibition. This research looks closely at enduring discourses around drug use, deviance, criminality, public health, and public safety fifty years into the War on Drugs. Through this work, I ask critical questions around state intervention, harm reduction, decriminalization, and drug user liberation.endrug decriminalizationsubstance use policyharm reduction, post-structuralismpolicy analysisWPR ApproachCarol BacchiPoster