Magazine Highlights Kleiman’s work on pot laws

Public Policy professor Mark Kleiman is the main character in a lengthy article in the Nov. 18, 2013, edition of The New Yorker covering Washington state’s plans for legalizing marijuana.

Calling him “one of the country’s most prominent and outspoken analysts of drug policy,” the article details Kleiman’s consultation with the Washington State Liquor Control Board over many months in 2013. The Board, which has been tasked with implementing Washington’s I-502 voter initiative legalizing the limited sale and use of marijuana, has grappled with a wide range of policy questions as it prepares to roll out the program in the new year. Kleiman advised the board through his consultancy, BOTEC Analysis Corp.

Although the main thrust of the article is the host of decisions confronting policy makers in Washington, Kleiman’s academic and professional experience is highlighted as well. From his days working in drug policy for the Justice Department during the Carter and Reagan administrations to his time at Harvard and UCLA, the article tracks Kleiman’s influence as one of the country’s leading drug policy experts.

“Mark has the advantage that he’s been thinking about these questions for decades,” the article quotes Nobel Prize-winning economist Thomas Schelling as saying. “He is the best there is on drugs.”

The full article is available on The New Yorker’s website.