Article Knowledge, Values, and Needle Exchange Programs in Sweden Lena Eriksson 1 and Johan Edman 1 Abstract Since the turn of the millennium, calls for evidence-based drug policy have become increasingly louder. In response, researchers have generated a large body of evidence in support of measures such as needle exchange programs (NEPs), while another strand of research testifies that policy makers often neglect to take the research evidence into account and hence fail to introduce these programs. This article studies the interplay between research-based knowledge, values, and policy making during 16 years of intense parliamentary debate in Sweden on the needle exchange issue. In 2000, the future of the two existing experimental NEPs was uncertain; in 2006, the regulations were reformed; and in 2015, they underwent a government inquiry. Both the reform and the inquiry aimed at regulating and expanding the programs. The analysis is guided by work done within the tradition of science-policy nexus, where the increased emphasis on evidence-based political measures is problematized. As drug policy arouses normative and ethical concerns, the analysis also explores values. The study illustrates the central role that values play in a policy field which is repeatedly declared to be science based. Within the overall framework of the Swedish drug policy ideology of a drug-free society, the advocates of NEPs framed drug misuse as a consequence of either an unjust society or a disease, arguing that because misuse is a condition beyond the control of the individual, the Swedish welfare state has an obligation to take care of those affected. For their part, the opponents framed drug misuse as a result of misguided attitudes, which would only be corrected by restrictions and prohibition. In their view, NEPs are a tool for drug policy liberalization. In the debate between the two positions, research evidence played only a minor role. Keywords drug-related harm, harm reduction, medicalization, needle and syringe programs, policy, qualitative research 1 Centre for Social Research on Alcohol and Drugs (SoRAD), Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden Received October 24, 2016. Accepted for publication February 26, 2017. Corresponding Author: Lena Eriksson, Centre for Social Research on Alcohol and Drugs (SoRAD), Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden. Email: lena.eriksson@sorad.su.se Contemporary Drug Problems 2017, Vol. 44(2) 105-124 ª The Author(s) 2017 Reprints and permission: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0091450917700143 journals.sagepub.com/home/cdx