Mayor of Amsterdam: 'In time, drug legalisation is inevitable’

Amsterdam has been grappling with the unwanted results of permissiveness for much longer. The world’s most liberal city has become one of the most visited: nearly 10mn tourists stayed there last year, above the pre-Covid peak. It is the city where everything goes and everyone goes. Many foreigners are drawn by cannabis and sex shows; some locals despair at the tawdriness.
The city’s mayor, Femke Halsema, is trying to clean up the excesses. In her office overlooking the Amstel river, she calls for more visitors “who love the canals”, rather than “urinate in them”.

But she says the deeper problem is less visible: the illegal market for cocaine is booming across Europe. In 2023, Dutch police intercepted record quantities but on the street cocaine prices remain low. “The only thing you can conclude [is] that there is more and more coming in and more and more money is made,” says Halsema, who begins her second, six-year term as mayor this week.

Amsterdam’s real problem is prohibition, she argues, and the answer is not less liberalisation, but more. She wants to end the Netherlands’ halfway policy on cannabis: coffee shops can sell it, but cannot buy it legally, meaning they have to buy from criminals. Other European countries have recently liberalised further.