Collection of 10 face-to-face life story interviews in southern Shan State, eastern Myanmar, exploring the theme of Drugs & Youth, carried out as part of the GCRF Drugs and (dis)order project. Interviews were carried out in the third and fourth year of the project and explore the key research theme of “Young people’s lives amidst drugs and disorder”, including its gendered dimensions, in depth.Drugs & (dis)order is a Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) project generating new evidence on how to transform illicit drug economies into peace economies in Afghanistan, Colombia and Myanmar. By 2030, more than 50% of the world’s poor will live in fragile and conflict-affected states. And many of today’s armed conflicts are fuelled by illicit drug economies in borderland regions. Trillions of dollars have been spent on the War on Drugs, but securitised approaches have failed. In fact, they often increase state fragility and adversely affect the health and livelihoods of communities and households. In light of these failures, there’s increasing recognition that drug policies need to be more pro-poor and aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). But the evidence base for this policy reform is patchy, politicised and contested. Drugs & (dis)order is helping to generate pro-poor policy solutions to transform illicit economies into peace economies. To do this we will: (1) Generate a robust evidence base on illicit drug economies and their effects on armed conflict, public health and livelihoods. (2) Identify new approaches and policy solutions to build more inclusive development and sustainable livelihoods in drugs affected contexts. (3) Build a global network of researchers and institutions in Afghanistan, Colombia, Myanmar and the UK to continue this work.

The field research has primarily focused on interviewing youth leaders, community leaders, civilians (including women, youth, elders), Shan Nationalities League for Democracy members, organisations working on drug issues and (ex) drug users and their family. Interviewees were mostly selected by snowballing, starting from connections SHAN already had with local media networks and youth groups. In addition, they also reached out to people and organisations such as school teachers, government administrators and local harm reduction organisations. The same question list as for 2019 interviews (dataset 855564) was used. Interviews were carried out by researchers recruited by Shan Herald Agency for News (SHAN). Interviews were conducted in Shan or Burmese and were audio-recorded when interviewees allowed this. Else notes were taken. All interviews have been transcribed and six have been translated to English.