Addiction interviews : evolution of a specialist field

Over recent years the study of addiction has moved from being a fragmented and under-developed area of science to become a forefront subject with its own identity.

This book describes that fascinating process of evolution through a series of probing face-to-face interviews with the international scientists and other actors in the field who helped make the process happen.

For instance, Sir Richard Doll, whose pioneering work helped establish the relationship between cigarette smoking and cancer of the lung, defines very personally his vision of science.

Dr Jerome Jaffe, America's first "Drugs Czar", describes how Richard Nixon came to see the national importance of the research base for a more effective response to America's devastating heroin problem among GIs during the Vietnam War.

Reported here altogether are 30 interviews - all the subjects were key witnesses and key participants in the birth of a modern scientific field.

The book should be of direct interest to researchers, clinicians and policy-makers in countries which are throughout the world trying to find better ways of dealing with alcohol, tobacco and illicit drugs. It is a book which both shares recent history and discerns future directions.

It is thus a statement of profound practical relevance, but also of inspirational value.

People in other fields should also find this book relevant as an exemplary account of how science comes to be made.