A2K as a Social Movement
From A2K Wiki
Panelists
Speakers:
- Margaret Chon - Professor of Law & Director, Center for the Study of Justice in Society (CSJS), Seattle University
- Ahmed Abdel Latif - Second Secretary, Department of International Organizations, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Egypt
- Ronaldo Lemos - Director of the Center for Technology & Society (CTS), Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV) Law School in Rio de Janeiro
- James Love - Director, Knowledge Ecology International (KEI)
- Sisule Musungu - World Trade Institute, University of Berne
- Jerome Reichman - Bunyan S. Womble Professor of Law, Duke University Law School
Moderator:
- Amy Kapczynski - Post-Doctoral Fellow in Law and Public Health, Samuelson Fellow in the Information Society Project, Yale Law School and Yale School of Public Health
Panel Description
This opening panel is intended to provide a brief introduction to the concept of access to knowledge (A2K), and to address the strengths and weaknesses in the past and future coalition or movement of A2K. We would like panelists generally to address themselves to the past and future of A2K as a concept, coalition, and movement.
Questions to be addressed will include:
- What is the genesis of the term "access to knowledge"? What issues and causes are grouped under its name?
- Are there issues that should be part of an access to knowledge framework, but currently are not?
- Does access to knowledge have a particular vision of what the access is for -- or of what the knowledge is for? Does it define who should have access? (Should some have preferential access, and on what terms?)
- Are demands for more property or control that are made in the name of social justice for, e.g., independent creators or communal farmers a central part of access to knowledge, or is the umbrella not broad enough to encompass calls for more rather than less property / control?
- Should A2K aspire to be predominantly a grassroots movement, or an issue advocacy network of experts, NGOs, businesses and government officials?
- Is A2K a term of convenience and coalition, or one that aspires to genuine conceptual coherence?
- Can or should there be a deep conceptual coherence across the diverse practices and places that have begun to speak of themselves as part of the access to knowledge campaign - or should the movement remain conceptually diverse and dispersed?
- Is the term best understood as an organizing convenience, an umbrella for a set of exceptions and limitations to IP law, a set of principles about the proper uses and distribution of knowledge, or something else?
Speaker Presentation Slides
Sisule Musungu
Remote Questions for the Panelists
Notes A
Harold Koh, Introduction
A social movement is: common identity, arguments, political change (says Amy Kapczynski, in forthcoming Yale Law Journal article)
I would encourage you to treat A2K as a human right.Think of A2K not just as an end-state, but as a means to others. This will fuse A2K to other human rights movements.
Amy Kapczynski, ISP Fellow, Samuelson-Glushko Fellow
Intellectual property rights over the last 10 years has become a subject of major social concern, not just a technical concern. Access to medicines, F/OSS, farmers' rights, protection of traditional knowledge, creative commons, open source genomics. Recently we've seen an effort from people in all these movements to bring these groups together.
The flashpoint was the Development Agenda process at WIPO. We've seen conferences, meetings, more campaigning at WIPO. And over time idea of consolidated movement has begun to capture people's attention.
But we all are wondering how people from such different traditions can come together and build something that works in concert. Models:
Strategic -- joining forces against a common enemy
Conceptually unified social movement -- But what is the movement about? It's not just opposition to IPR; that's why "A2K" is attractive. Is it about economics, human development? Human rights? Distributive justice or equality? Democratizing the domain of knowledge so everyone can benefit from it and help contribute to the store of human knowledge?
These possibilities aren't mutually exclusive, but some become more important.
What is the structural model? Led by experts? Grassroots?
In many ways, questions can only be answered organically, as they are. This conference is part of that organic process.
Ahmed Abdel Latif, Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Title: Genesis of A2K as a Concept and the Future of A2K as a Social Movement
"Knowledge diplomacy": Global web of int'l organizations, agreements and arrangements which have an impact on knowledge flows and goods.
Changing nature of Knowledge Diplomacy
- Expansion of global trade and IP rules. Linking trade and IP led countries to make decisions differently. No longer a narrow technical area.
- Global norm setting vs. national legislation. Global rules now induce changes in national legislation. Not as many checks and balances.
- Proliferation of processes at the global, regional, and bilateral level. Easier to forum shift.
- Diversification of int'l standard-setting. We used to talk about global treaties. But now more soft law, e.g., WIPO internet domain name process, bilateral investment process.
- Fragmentation of national policy making. Many ministries involved.
Genesis of A2K as a concept
- Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health (2001)
- Report of the Commission on Intellectual Property Rights (2002)
- TACD New York Meeting on Access to Essential Learning Tools (April 2004). Panels on access to: textbooks, academic journals, distance education, data software. Information vs. knowledge? Choose "knowledge" b/c a broader concept and has more universal appeal.
- Declaration on the future of WIPO: The Proposal of a Development Agenda for WIPO (Sept 2004)
A2K as a Concept
- Legitimacy
- Universality
- Inclusiveness
Promoting A2K as a Global Issue
We need to promote A2K as a positive agenda: addressing effects of expansion of global rules in trade; new tools to promote access.
We need to know, are we: awareness raising, policy making, norm setting. Each different piece may require a different strategy.
Challenges:
- risk of dispersion and dilution;
- bringing in new relevant communities e.g., museums, tranlation;
- sense of urgency;
- economics-based evidence, measurements of A2K
- building support in the South
- reaching to "friendly" busienss
- disseminating "best practices" and promoting use of "flexibilities"
- achieve concrete results in multilateral fora
- standard-setting is necessary, but elusive and uncertain
- which is the right forum? WIPO? (good chart)
Learning from trajectory of other social movements
- Environmental
- Cultural diversity
- Protecting traditional knowledge
James Love, Knowledge Ecology International
Structure of the social movement
The government delegates encouraged NGOs to participate at WIPO, after cooperation at WTO. NGOs weren't sure whether it was worth participating in WIPO.
My group started out working on many different issues, all conceptualized as access to knowledge goods. But back in the day there was no shared identity between different movements.
When the Transatlantic Consumer Dialog started holding meetings in 2002, we got people from different movements in the same room. Innovative businesses also became important, particularly in the internet realm.
We were trying to avoid idea that someone who worked on IP was opposed to private property, so people in access to medicines would say copyright was OK, and vice versa.
We're now beyond that. People see access as more general. The YLS conferences have elevated the status in the academic community, along with many scholars here.
The social movement is bigger than the institutions -- it penetrates the institutions via the committed individuals. Key to future success is making their institutions move in the right direction. In access to medicines, MSF took the lead in bringing in new institutions.
The next conference should have more government people.
Analytic categories of strategy
- Market solutions: Negotiating prices, voluntary solutions, e.g. CC
- Non-remunerative statutory exemptions (e.g., fair use)
- Remunerative legal exemptions: Property right, have to pay, but rights owner has no ability to stop you from using, i.e. compulsory licensing.
- Civil disobedience
Of these four, remunerative rights are the most controverial. People have the idea that prices must be set by rights owners, not third parties.
Multilateral negotiations
In February we got a good agreement from WIPO. This June will be a discussion of whether WIPO moves forward to a treaty on A2K. That will be a much more difficult negotiation.
WHO has a very important intiative called the Intergovernmental Working Group (IGWG). Looking for another way to pay for medical innovation while retaining access. Important that they've combined access and innovation as goals that must both go forward.
Challenge is to transform framework so discussion doesn't center on IPR, but on R&D itself.
Can you have prizes instead of prices? Economy where profit-making firms compete to make new drugs, and reward is not control, but money paid through a multilateral system? If we invent another way, we can have generic-priced drugs from Mozambique to Beverly Hills.
Margaret Chon, Professor
Access
Distinguish b/t DVDs, textbooks. We need to link "access" to particular social outcomes or policies. We shouldn't let policy on "piracy" of DVDs drive policy on access to textbooks.
Access has long been accepted as a legitimate part of IPR policy, back to Statute of Anne. But within the global trade framework, access is no longer part of the legitimate policy balance. That is where this movement steps in.
Knowledge
IPR thinks it's the only regulatory regime competent to manage knowledge goods. Regulation is more holistic. I've adopted Sen's development as freedom approach, and includes human development as part of the regulatory framework.
Equality
- Equality can enhance efficiency.
- Focus on equality suggests links to other social movements. A2K should be capacious enough to make links to other social movements and values.
- "Knowledge is property" can be countered with positive slogans, like "Silence = Death" in the AIDS movement. e.g., Jamie's "Deadweight loss = Dead bodies."
Jerome Reichman, Professor, Duke Law School
(missed)
Ronaldo Lemos, FGV
Cultural industry faces structural change in Brazil
Cultural industry declining. Sales of CD's radically declining. Largest music publisher released very few CD's. Daily circulation of big newspapers dropping. Sales of books declining. Brazilian movie industry declining, and fewer are attending movie theaters.
Business models emerging from the commons
Open business project. "Let's share business models." Focuses on analyzing business models emerging from the commons.
Didn't want to focus on legal commons created by licenses.
Another kind of commons
Interested in peripheries: Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Argentina, Nigeria.
Results of study of Brazil's Tecnobrega
Music from Pará. Released 400+ CD's, 100+ DVD's. Very evolved and consistent music industry.
Technology drives this industry, in very poor regions.
Music sold by street vendors, same people who sell "pirated" goods. But people from technobrega industry rely on street vendors.
Bands/DJ composers pay recording studios to record music. Give recordings to Distributors/Street vendors (for free). Public buys the records. Artists get paid by concerts, soundsystem companies/parties. The producer/party funder finance the parties, sometimes collect interest. The bands/DJ's also sell their records directly to public at the live concerts. Sometimes they record their live performances and sell them right after the performance.
Did large study of the industry:
- 88% of artists have had no contact with record labels.
- Average salary for bands is $350. More than average monthly salary in the region.
- Aggregate monthly revenue for bands is $1.6m.
- Artists don't compete w/street vendors in market for CD's and DVD's. Product differentiation -- if buy from artists, more expensive, and better wrapping materials.
Legal pluralism: social commons, legal commons
This peripheral (non-legal) commons exists where IP is unknown, irrelevant, unenforceable. This is a "social commons."
Social commons in North too: mix tapes, internet.
When think about A2K, must pay attention to social commons.
Bottom line: what's law got to do with it?
Sisule Musungu
We need to think about all possible scenarios, not just the ones we want.
Four scenarios
The European Patent Office (EPO) has put out a book on possible shape of the patent system in 20 years. They outline 4 possible scenarios.
- Business is dominant driver. New forms of subject matter become protectable. Changes to deal w/trolls and anti-competitive practices. A2K and public interest are largely irrelevant.
- Geopolitics are dominant driver. Developed countries fail to maintain technological lead, lose to China, Brazil, India, etc. These countries fight over IP system to maintain geopolitical dominance. But fight excludes developing country and A2K issues not a priority.
- Trees of knowledge scenario. Development, public interest are dominant drivers. Patents survive only in marginal areas. Patent offices closed.
- New system addresses new technologies, old patent system for current technologies. A2K not a dominant movement.
Forces that could shape future
- Power.
- Rules of the global jungle.
- Rate of change.
- Systemic risk.
- Knowledge paradox. Better ways of exploiting knowledge than patent system.
Strategies for A2K movement
We need to think long term.
Q & A
How do we develop a language? Why do we say "strong" IPR instead of "maximalists" or "exploiters"?
JL: It's good to talk straightforwardly about ideas people are proposing. More important than attacking what don't like is talking about what we do like. You have to give people a vision and understanding of how they get to a good future. If no one can concretely figure out how things will work, including at economic level, that undermines the movement. Plain-talking, practical things are important.
AL: Development agenda reflected fundamental desire to reframe the language. Control of the language is very important.
Are access and traditional knowledge two separate movements?
JL: Some of the TK movement is about people seeking more control. Part of it is about access and fairness about systems. It's an interesting and complicated issue.
SM: (missed) There could be overlap b/t two groups.
JR: Deal w/TK w/a liability rule.
RL: Majority of exchanges of TK take place among non-Europeans. TK groups also exchange w/rich countries w/o compensating them.
Can we talk about earlier movements, like decolonization and copyright?
JL: It does go way back, but the branding question is recent.
AL: This movement uniquely brings together communities from North and South.
What about the propaganda war as a piece of movement building?
Is the Nigerian film industry's robustness a result of social or legal commons?
RL: Completely built on social commons. Model built on assumption that could not count on IP. Must assume content will be duplicated. Producers say piracy helped them, b/c enabled them to supply market they couldn't otherwise supply. Nigeria now under a lot of pressure to change IP laws. Producers themselves are worried about consequences.
What role is China playing the development agenda? What is the impact of their intervention?
JL: Low profile, but probably not forever.
SM: Low-key on development agenda, but that is consistent with behavior in other fora. They will probably be flexing muscle more. E.g., WIPO created an additional deputy director position b/c China has complained it has been left out.
JR: Riven by ambivalence. They and India are patenting a lot.
Have there been exploitable differences b/t industries, like biotech and software, in the WIPO development agenda?
JR: These industries may cut a deal.
Which of the four scenarios is the most likely?
SM: We should avoid using the scenarios for prediction.
JR: Amazing that the EPO is taking compensatory liability seriously. A lot of progress in last 13 years.
Notes B
Opening of A2K2
Opening line: "Thanks to Microsoft." ;)
There are Various reasons to not talk about A2K as a human right. But, there are arguments for talking about A2K as a right. Article 19 of UDHR.
The right of access to private information is then a claim by some rightsholders against others. So this could trigger a countermovement. So lawyers have to balance law to both seek info and hold it in proprietary format.
The pol econ of IP led to IP maximalism.
Those who favored A2K had defensive victories, but didn't go on the offensive. Until now.
Now an international legal process is beginning, with DevAgenda,
and the idea of an A2K Treaty that would flip things so that rights to access are the rule rather than exception.
This conference is being held on the weekend of world intellectual property day.
Will be a key place for building coalitions and mobilizing.
People here need to organize a panel (or go to a panel) at the US Social Forum, on A2K.
Knowledge development, network building, transnational legal process.
"As dean, my primary goal has been promoting globalization, business ties, etc."
We need a Treaty to promote A2K as a human right.
Amy Kapczynski (sp?):
Fellow here, and also in Public Health.
A2Medicines campaign, FOSS, farmers, creative commons, open source genomics, etc. Recently, efforts to come together.
"The flash point was the campaign for a DA."
How can groups from different traditions work together? What models for working together do we have?
Strategic: join forces against a common enemy. Strategic coalition. or, A2K as conceptually coherent social movement. Opposition to IP law? But oppositionalism isn't satisfying. Is it about Global Public Goods? Human Rights? Distributive Justice or Equality? Democratizing knowledge domain?
These models may not be mutually exclusive but some of them will emerge as more powerful.
Is it a network? Centralized? led by experts? A grassroots movement?
Our 6 panelists will give us some sense of the history of the movement, strategy, campaigns to work together on in the future.
Ahmed Abdel Latif (egyptian ministry of foreign affairs) - on the term A2K
A diplomat. Job is to help negotiate treaties between states. Globalization of knowledge has brought a demand for new treaties that regulate knowledge. "Knowledge diplomacy." Expansion of global trade and IP rules. Global norm setting vs. national legislation. And, proliferation of processes at global, regional, and bilateral level.
Genesis of A2K concept.
- TACD New York meeting on Access to Essential Learning Tools (NY, April 2004)
They had panels on access to textbooks, academic journals, distance education, data, software. Had a conversation over difference between information and knowledge.
- Declaration on Future of WIPO and proposal for Development Agenda (September, 2004)
Ancient Egypt: God Toth of knowledge and wisdom.
A2K should not just be opposition, has to also be put forward as a positive agenda. Both moderate the effects of trade regime, but promote alternative processes.
Need to learn from trajectory of other movements. He compared it to environmentalism and cultural diversity.
Different activities: Awareness raising, policy making, norm setting, mainstreaming. Which are we focusing on?
Challenges: dispersion and dilution. We need to bring in new communities and issues. For example, museums. Translation is another big barrier, and linked to copyright. How to build sense of urgency. And, to use economic based evidence, measurements of A2K. Need to build support in the south and also reach out to friendly businesses.
What forum is the right forum?
Jamie Love - retrospective account of A2K movement. 'Knowledge ecology international' rebranding. In 2001, when WTO adopted Doha Declaration, there were a small group of delegates to WIPO from developing countries who thought it was the right moment to push. The delegates thought it was important for NGOs to participate in the debate at the time. Some people thought that the NGOs coming to WIPO came from outside, but it was driven by delegates from developing countries who wanted to encourage the collaboration.
Been working on this for 18 years. Internet, software, access to medicine. So from the very beginning were thinking about a general problem of access to knowledge goods. Independent movements all over the place, FOSS, librarians, distance education, human genome, medicines, etc. When TACD started holding these meetings in 2002, you had people from MSF sitting with Stallman and with Martin Khor. Also the innovative businesses started to come in. People used to get fierce attacks and red baiting. People in medicine used to say 'we have a problem with patents, but copyright is OK,' and vice versa. People would say 'we're not communist, but.' People know see Access as more general. Yale has elevated the status in the academic community.
There's a social movement in part because it relates to what people are actually doing as individuals. There are institutions, and individuals, and institutions are run by individuals. A social movement that transcends, penetrates, and transforms the institutions. A2K will succeed or fail in the future to the degree to which people can move the institutions in the right direction.
MSF installed a degree of tolerance and respect in people about different ways to achieve access to medicine. Have an open mind about who to include in the conversation.
In the future we should have people from the USG and EC in the room.
Voluntary licenses. (creative commons) Exceptions to rights. Remunerative right (compulsory licensing) Civil Disobediencce (the law just doesn't work)
Piracy is less controversial than remunerative rights. Because of the idea that prices are set by the rights holder, not by a third party. So how about having both a payday and access?
WIPO is in a critical stage on the DA discussions. Progress was made in February. A lot of people were happy with it. In June there will be a formal WIPO discussion about whether to move forward on DA. WIPO Intergovernmental Working Group: talking about a new way to pay for innovation in medicines. Complex negotiation on pricing, access, innovation. They are saying you have to have both access and innovation, without giving up on either goal. Can we transform the global framework to be about R&D itself? Incentive to develop a drug: can you replace prices with prizes? An economy where profit making firms don't get a monopoly, they get a prize. Medicine is the strongest case for the patent system. So if we can have a working prize system for medicine we can have generic prices from Beverly Hills to Mozambique.
Margaret Chan - how might the movement sustain itself without relying on oppositional model
Access to a DVD for entertainment is very different from access to a textbook. We have to be careful when we talk about access, what outcomes are we linking it to. It doesn't mean the same thing all the time. Piracy of DVDs shouldn't push policy on access to textbooks. Access is part of that IP balance that is being thrown off with the excessive focus on the producer perspective. Nonexclusive and nonrivalrous quality of knowledge goods. Policy makers have failed to understand that copying, diffusion, and mimicry are the lifeblood of social progress.
In legal scholarship, this understanding has been articulated explicity starting 20-30 years ago. In the US, there is a consensus that access is part of the policy balance.
Developed countries have been exporting copyright norms without exporting free speech norms. ...
We have to be critical of 'development,' 'sustainable development' etc.
We have to focus on outcomes, not only framework.
A substantive HDI focused measure of the impact of knowledge / IPRs.
Human Development: focus on the outcomes of social arrangements. Literacy rates, life expectancy.
So, we should figure out other ways to look at knowledge goods, not only measure the economic impact. Knowledge goods can be regulated through more than just IPRs.
Equality of outcomes for the 3 billion people on the bottom half of the global economy. - Equality IS consistent with efficiency, and can enhance efficiency. - Focus on equality would link us to other social movements. Social movements are messy. Early 1980s AIDS activism was around closing of gay bathhouses. By mid 1980s, shifted to demands for research into treatment. ACT UP. Demands for research into drug development. Mid 1990s, linkage to Access to Medicines movement so that PWHA in developing countries could get access. USG was in denial. There had to be outrageous street theater. Those AIDS activists didn't know they would impact global trade policy a decade later. A2K has to be a social movement that links more to other movements.
There was an earlier 'A2K' movement, Jamie Boyle, North North issues, rhetoric of freedom, not equality. That was 1.0.
It's hard to kill the idea that knowledge is property. We don't wan to only be an oppositional movement.
ACT UP had slogans: Kissing doesn't Kill. Silence=Death.
Access to Knowledge Exporting dysfunctional system to the rest of the world
[Think about slogans, chants, other ways to frame for public]
Jerry Reichman (Duke lawyer): on states' responsibility to supply public goods.
Knowledge is a Global Public Good: basic input into technology, innovation, etc. Global governance system has weak provisions for global public goods. One exception was GATT: private producers established mechanism... many economies have become 'knowledge economies.' Well organized push by private multinational companies to enforce TRIPS. Collective action: private special interests captured and defined regulation of knowledge goods at the global level without resistance from states. OECD exporters of knowledge goods pulled the rug out from under public ministers in developing countries. This process continues today in the bilateral regime. Ministers of health and welfare are powerless to block or fight. There are no balancing mechanisms in developing countries. True social costs of IPRs are only now becoming revealed. Access to Medicines and Access to Knowledge campaigns are serious countervailing force for collective action to push back against the OECD exporters of knowledge goods. [Thinks the goal was to restore the balance that developed countries had, but for developing countries.] These initiatives are weakly rooted in the international arena. IPR and trade law doesn't leave much space for domestic producers of public goods. Health ministers, etc. aren't represented at the WTO. Cut off from Geneva and from trade negotiators. So, what strategies? We should have long term goals but also short and medium term. For example, we have concrete proposals for changes to IP laws. Single states, especially in developing countries, should enact such laws. Groups of states can create regional precedents. Create Fact on the Ground. Build trust and common interest among developing countries. Resist IPR components of FTAs. At national level, interagency coordination and review. Maximize existing flexibilities. Misuse laws can address refusal to deal. Challenge patent pools by multinationals that block developing country firms. Compulsory licenses. Fight refusals to deal.
UNESCO: member states are bound to implement education as a human right. Yet UNESCO hasn't been pushed to try and get access to educational textbooks. [UNESCO has no teeth...]
German government: putting millions of EUros into local African production of medicines. WB loans to promote access to medicines are not taken up by dev countries cause they don't want to commit to meeting public health goals.
A2K should keep pushing on WIPO.
"Knowledge cartel" has compromised states' ability to provide public goods.
Ronaldo Lemos - emerging cultural industries in Brazil, Colombia, Mexico. rlemos@fgv.br
1977: portuguese professor boaventura de sousa santos did a study about land occupation. Started an important school of thought called "legal pluralism."
Cultural industry in Brazil: drop in past 5 years of physical units sold. Newspapers are also dropping significantly in daily circulation. In publishing of books, there is also a drop. Top 5 box office films in Brazil were all hollywood. Also a drop in box office sales.
What business models are emerging from the commons? Open business. Brazil, South Africa, etc. Open Business. So-called "web 2.0 projects" Trama Virtual (musical site) videolog (brazilian youtube) overmundo (indymedia type) SciFlo (scientific library online)
But decided they weren't interested in legal commons (licenses). You can create a legal commons, but open business project in Brazil more interested in other kinds of commons. What is happening in peripheries? Appropriation of technology to create their own cultural industries. Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Argentina, Nigeria.
Tecnobrega, in state of Para. 'Technocheezy.' Mix of of cheezy 80s songs. Tecnobrega releases +400 CDs a year, more than 100 DVDs. You won't find tecnobrega in the stores, you find it in street vendors. It's not piracy, cause people in the scene deliver the stuff to be sold by the street vendors.
iCommons conference in June in Croatia.
Overview of the tecnobrega industry. Artists pay indy recording studios. Then they give them for free to the street vendors, who sell them. The public buys the records. How do the artists get paid? By the concert halls, the sound system parties. There's the producer or party funder (VC), they finance everything. Sometimes they collect interest. Bands and DJs sell directly to the public at the live conferences. Record during the gig, then sell to the audience immediately after.
Interviewed 279 bands, 273 soundsystems, 259 street vendors. 88% of artists never had a record label. 59% said street vendors help business. 12 concerts per month, 8 solo and 4 with other bands. Solo performance: $1,100, other band $700, average salary per month is $300. Aggregate monthly revenue. 1.6 million dollars. Average sales of 77 CDs at a concert and 53 DVDs. Artists don't compete with street vendors. Product differentiation (better graphics, etc.)
Average 6 parties per month by a soundsystem, 4,000 parties per month in Para. 1.5 million per month revenues for sound systems. Fixed assets of all soundsystems: 8 million.
On the one side there's a legal commons, on the other side a commons where IP is irrelevant, unknown or unenforceable. There is a social commons, not just legal commons.
When we consider the A2K movement, pay attention not only to the legal commons but also to the social commons.
Sisule Musungu
Consider various scenarios. What might patent system look like in 20 years?
European Patent Office. This is a scenario planning exercise for 2025.
1. Market Rules - grey scenario. Dominant players consolidate patents game. A2K has no traction.
2. Fools Game - red scenario. OECD countries fail to maintain tech superiority and fall to Brazil China etc. But there's a fight over using IP system to maintain scenario. A2K issues continue to have some relevance, but on the whole these issues are not a priority.
3. Trees of Knowledge - green scenario. Public interest and A2K the dominant drivers. The credibility of the critique of the IP system changes governments' minds. A2K concerns become central. Formal patent agencies have been turned into knowledge agencies.
4. Blue Skies - tech is the dominant driver. Tech forces change in the patent system. A2K has impact but not dominant.
5 forces shaping the future: 1. power (various players), 2. rules, 3. rate of change, 4. systemic risk, 5. knowledge barriers.
Q&A
- Some of TK movement is about control. - A2K as brand - 19th of April in the EPO they were chanting 'A2K, A2K.' (?!) - Some of TK objectives are shared. But core groups of TK are not part of core of A2K. - China has been low key in Development Agenda. Now is talking about how they have been left out of the decisionmaking process.
Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe: decentralization of power. "It's all in flux and flow"
What's new now from the 1970s movement: the current stage brings together the N&S.
WIPO in 2001 was going to try to push language like 'IPRs are the basis of human existence.'
R.Lemos: wrote an article a couple years ago about TK. Solomon Islands sample that then made it into megahit of electronic music by 'Deep Forest.' But, the majority of exchange of indigenous knowledge happens between indigenous peoples. TK has to consider that exchanges take place between peripheral groups themselves. So this makes it harder. Regarding Nigerian film scene: it began in the beginning of the 1990s. Film producers say that piracy helped them. Helped create markets that they previously couldn't reach (kenya, etc.) Now Nigeria is under heavy pressure to do enforcement. The movie producers themselves are worried re this!
Resources and papers
Articles
Strategies for organizing civil society
Tides Foundation, What's Next -- Supporting the Evolution of Change Movements
The New World Foundation, Funding Social Movements
Books
Web Resources
www.bibalex.org/a2k
