Ayahuasca, Entheogenic Education & Public Policy

348 Pages·2015·2.03 MB·English

by  Kenneth Tupper

AYAHUASCA, ENTHEOGENIC EDUCATION & PUBLIC POLICY

by

Kenneth William Tupper

M.A., Simon Fraser University, 2002

A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF
THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

in

The Faculty of Graduate Studies

(Educational Studies)

THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

(Vancouver)

April, 2011

© Kenneth William Tupper, 2011
Abstract
Ayahuasca is an entheogenic decoction prepared from two Amazonian plants containing
controlled substances, including dimethyltryptamine. Traditionally drunk ritually (and revered as
a healing “plant teacher”) by Amazonian indigenous and mestizo peoples, in the 20th century
ayahuasca became a sacrament for several new Brazilian religions. One of these, the Santo
Daime, has expanded into Canada, where in 2001 a Montreal-based chapter applied for a federal
legal exemption to allow drinking of the brew in its rituals.

This dissertation undertakes a critical policy analysis of Health Canada’s decision on the Santo
Daime request, using government documents obtained through an Access to Information request
as data. My goals are to illustrate how modern stereotypes about “drugs” and “drug abuse” in
dominant public and political discourses may hinder well-informed policy decision making about
ayahuasca, and to consider how entheogenic practices such as ayahuasca drinking are traditional
indigenous ways of knowing that should be valued, rather than reflexively demonized and
criminalized. My research method is a critical discourse analysis approach to policy analysis, an
eclectic means of demonstrating how language contributes to conceptual frames and political
responses to public policy issues. I combine insights from recent research on language, discourse
and public policy to show how ayahuasca has become an unexpected policy conundrum for
liberal democratic states attempting to balance competing interests of criminal justice, public
health, and human rights such as religious freedom.

I trace ayahuasca’s trajectory as a contemporary policy concern by sketching histories of
psychoactive substance use, today’s international drug control regime, and the discursive
foundations of its underlying drug war paradigm. Regarding Health Canada’s 2006 decision “in
principle” to recommend exemption for the Daime brew, I critique how the government defined
ayahuasca as a policy problem, what policy stakeholders it considered in its decision making,
and what knowledge about ayahuasca it used. To conclude, I explore modern schooling’s
systemic antipathy to wonder and awe, and propose that policy reforms allowing circumspect use
of entheogens such as ayahuasca as cognitive tools may help stimulate re-enchantment and
appreciation of the need to address human and planetary ecological predicaments of the 21st
century.
ii
Preface

The Appendix to this dissertation is the result of research and writing I did during my doctoral
program that was published as an article titled “Ayahuasca healing beyond the Amazon: The
globalization of a traditional indigenous entheogenic practice” in Global Networks: A Journal of
Transnational Affairs, volume 9, issue 1, in January 2009 (pp. 117-136). It is reprinted here with
the permission of the journal. Other than pagination, I have kept the style, punctuation,
formatting and other elements of the text the same as the final published version.

iii
Table of Contents

Abstract .................................................................................................................................... ii
Preface ..................................................................................................................................... iii
Table of Contents ................................................................................................................... iv
List of Tables .......................................................................................................................... vi
List of Abbreviations ............................................................................................................ vii
Acknowledgements .............................................................................................................. viii
Dedication ............................................................................................................................. viii
Chapter 1 – Introduction........................................................................................................ 1
1.1 – Goal, Objectives & Overview ...................................................................................... 3
1.2 – Public Interest in Ayahuasca ........................................................................................ 9
1.3 – Psychonautic Drinking ............................................................................................... 12
1.4 – Cross-cultural Vegetalismo ........................................................................................ 14
1.5 – Santo Daime ............................................................................................................... 16
1.6 – Review of the Ayahuasca Literature .......................................................................... 20
Amazonian Cosmologies ................................................................................................. 22
Ethnobotany & Pharmacology......................................................................................... 23
Human Physiology .......................................................................................................... 28
Psychology....................................................................................................................... 35
Health/Medicine .............................................................................................................. 41
Spirituality ....................................................................................................................... 46
Westernization/Globalization .......................................................................................... 50
Chapter 2 – Theoretical Foundations & Methods ............................................................. 61
2.1 – Public Policy .............................................................................................................. 61
2.2 – Discursive Policy Analysis & Critical Discourse Analysis ....................................... 68
2.3 – Epistemic Standpoint.................................................................................................. 77
Chapter 3 – Ayahuasca as Policy Issue in the 21st Century .............................................. 83
3.1 – Pre-modern Psychoactive Substance Use .................................................................. 84
3.2 – Psychoactive Substance Use in Early Modernity ....................................................... 91
3.4 – Professionalization & the Path to Prohibition .......................................................... 114
iv
3.5 – The 20th Century & Modern International Drug Control ......................................... 123
Chapter 4 – Discourses & the Drug War Paradigm ........................................................ 131
4.1 – What is a “Drug”? .................................................................................................... 132
4.2 – Drug Metaphors ........................................................................................................ 144
Chapter 5 – The Canadian “Daime Tea” Policy Decision ............................................... 157
5.1 – Canadian Politics & Human Rights ......................................................................... 158
5.2 – The Controlled Drugs and Substance Act & Section 56 .......................................... 160
Exemptions for Medical Purposes ................................................................................. 162
Exemptions for Scientific Purposes ............................................................................... 167
Exemptions “Otherwise in the Public Interest” ............................................................. 171
5.3 – International Context ................................................................................................ 174
5.4 – Céu do Montreal’s Section 56 Exemption Request ................................................. 182
5.5 – Policy Analysis: Problem Definition ........................................................................ 190
5.6 – Policy Analysis: Actors & Stakeholders .................................................................. 200
5.7 – Policy Analysis: Knowledge & Evidence ................................................................ 209
5.8 – Policy Analysis: Conclusion .................................................................................... 216
Chapter 6 – Conclusion: Entheogenic Education—Ayahuasca as a Plant Teacher ..... 219
6.1 – Wonder & Awe ........................................................................................................ 224
6.2 – Cognitive Tools ........................................................................................................ 236
6.3 – Ritual & Harm Reduction ........................................................................................ 241
6.4 – Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 246
Works Cited ......................................................................................................................... 252
Appendix .............................................................................................................................. 313

v
List of Tables

Table 1: Schema of Modern Stereotypes of Psychoactive Substances………………………137

vi
List of Abbreviations

CDA = critical discourse analysis
CDSA = Controlled Drugs and Substances Act (of Canada)
CEFLURIS = Centro Eclético da Fluente Luz Universal Raimundo Irineu Serra
CEFLUSMME = Centro Eclético da Fluente Luz Universal Sebastião Mota de Melo
CHLQ = Church of the Holy Light of the Queen
CONAD = Conselho Nacional Antidrogas, or National Antidrugs Council (of Brazil)
CONFEN = Conselho Federal de Entorpecentes, or Federal Narcotics Counsel (of Brazil)
DMT = N,N-dimethyltryptamine
INCB = International Narcotics Control Board
LSD = lysergic acid diethylamide
MAO = monoamine oxidase
MMT = methadone maintenance treatment
P/Ts = Provinces and Territories (of Canada)
RCMP = Royal Canadian Mounted Police
RFRA = Religious Freedom Restoration Act (of the United States)
UDV = União do Vegetal
UN = United Nations
WCTU = Women’s Christian Temperance Union

vii
Acknowledgements

I would sincerely like to thank:

My supervisor Dr. Daniel Vokey, for his willingness to guide me on the intellectual journey of
writing this dissertation, and his close reading and constructive feedback along the way;

My other committee members, Dr. Tirso Gonzales and Dr. Dennis McKenna, for their
encouragement, advice and support through my research and writing process;

Professors with whom I took courses during my doctoral program—including Dr. Anne Phelan,
Dr. Jennifer Vadeboncoeur, Dr. Charles Ungerleider at UBC, and Dr. Susan Boyd at the
University of Victoria—whose assignments contributed to several of my published articles;

My supervisors in the Population and Public Health Division of the British Columbia Ministry of
Health Services, Warren O’Briain and Andrew Hazlewood, whose encouragement, support and
flexibility allowed me to pursue doctoral studies concurrent to my civil service employment;

The founder of Céu do Montreal, Madrinha Jessica Rochester, for her courage and leadership in
applying for a Section 56 exemption, and her trust in me and support for my research project;

My late friend Paul Haden, for his passionate belief that my ideas were important, and for
introducing me to his brother Mark Haden, now a close friend, colleague and co-educator;

My dear friend Yalila Espinoza, for her love and support, and her firm encouragement that I
pursue doctoral studies at UBC;

The various members of Vancouver’s Keeping the Door Open: Dialogues on Drug Use
committee, who invited me to participate in their public education projects and opened a door
into the world of drug policy and drug policy reform;

My late father, William Tupper, my mother, Frances Tupper, my brother Robert Tupper, and my
other family who offered unconditional love and support for my eclectic educational endeavours;

And finally, the spirit vine and plant teacher, ayahuasca, for inspiring me to embark on and
follow through with this research project, and fostering passion, courage, sensitivity, humility,
and a profusion of wonder and awe along the way.
Dedication
viii
I dedicate this dissertation to Andrea Langlois, mon amour, my partner and best friend
(not to mention editor and communications advisor extraordinaire), whose love,
patience and support have enriched both my academic pursuits and my life . . .

ix
Chapter 1 – Introduction

The 21st century presents an unprecedented set of challenges and opportunities for the human
species. Since the advent of modern economics, science and governance a few hundred years
ago, the growth of the human population and our species’ ability to impact our environment have
created a set of ecological problems that, unless addressed, will radically transform planetary
ecosystems. Critics of the modern imperative for economic growth (or “development”), with its
insatiable appetite for non-renewable resources and drive to control the very forces of life itself,
warn that this unchecked growth threatens to destabilize the delicate homeostasis that has been
the foundation of biological evolution on earth. However, many feel at a loss to explain what—
other than complete ecological or economic collapse (or both)—might compel us collectively to
recognize the nature of our predicament and, if there is still time, take action to avert its
foreseeable consequences. Public opinion and political action would each seem to require the
other in order to overcome the inertia of the present unsustainable economic/ecological status
quo, yet neither shows leadership commensurate with the apparent urgency of the matter.

At the same time, public education and modern ways of knowing may also be impediments to
deeper systemic cultural changes. It may be that contemporary schooling is not an optimal means
for cultivating awareness of and generating timely, creative solutions to the human ecological
predicament. Perhaps a very different kind of learning is required, one that has served other
human cultures well for millennia, but has been ignored or dismissed through the hubris of
modern governmental, ecclesiastical, academic and other authorities. This dissertation considers
the possibility that ayahuasca, a preparation discovered and revered as a “plant teacher” by
peoples of the Amazon rain forest, may offer a kind of ecological learning that is urgently
needed at this moment in our species’ cultural evolutionary trajectory in a global planetary
context; however, it also considers how ill-founded modern drug control policies present an
obstacle to recognizing this possibility. To begin, I will briefly describe what ayahuasca is, and
how and why people in both traditional Amazonian and modern globalized contexts drink it, and
then will discuss the overall goal and subsidiary objectives of my research.

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