Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper explores the increasing significance of intellectual property rights for the appropriation of surplus value in capitalism. Building on Marx's analysis of the value form and extending it to the commodification of knowledge, it develops a Marxian critique of informational capitalism based on the basic categories of value theory; inter alia, this looks at the commodification of knowledge from the viewpoint of commodity fetishism, the enclosure of traditional knowledge, the formal subsumption of intellectual labour, the real subsumption of intellectual labour, and the role of intellectual property rights as a contradictory means to support the average rate of profit for firms specializing in immaterial production (whilst enabling them to appropriate monopoly profits). The second part of the paper inquires whether these arguments lend support to a Polanyian interpretation of knowledge as a fictitious commodity. On the basis of the arguments already deployed, plus further arguments, it is suggested that knowledge can function as a non-commodity, a quasi-commodity, a fictitious commodity, a real commodity, and as fictive capital. This has interesting implications for the concepts of primitive accumulation and accumulation through dispossession.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: No abstract available at this time.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This research-in-progress is an ongoing empirical study that incorporates my two main research interests: (1) intellectual property law and (2) the legal profession. I am especially interested in understanding how, why, and to what effect lawyers’ roles in the enforcement of asserted intellectual property rights affects the scope of rights owners’ ability to successfully claim intellectual property protection, primarily in the areas of trademark, copyright, and the right of publicity. Although there is some scholarship that has begun to explore how targets of IP enforcement resist assertions of IP claims, this work is one of the only empirical studies of what lawyers—and their IP-owner clients—actually do in the everyday enforcement of IP rights "under the radar" and in the "shadow of the law". This study is based on both case studies as well as in-depth, semi-structured interviews with IP lawyers who regularly assert IP rights on behalf of largely “repeat player” IP owner clients. One theme explored in this research is whether the intellectual property “Haves” come out ahead in IP enforcement and, if so, what difference it makes. This research also explores, among other issues, whether over-enforcement of intellectual property rights has a deleterious effect on free speech and a vigorous public domain.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Although the effects of global intellectual property (IP) regimes have their most profound effects in the third world, decisions over these regimes are fixed in the first world. The debates preceding these decisions are contested by advocates and critics of IP alike, and both sides mobilize representations of development to buttress their cases. Comparing public discourse over IP regimes in agriculture provides an insight into the political economy not only of the agricultural industry, but also of the transnational representation of development. We examine the debates over genetically modified (GM) seeds in the U.S. and Europe, noting how third world bodies are mobilized, and how discourses of poverty are used to justify or criticize the promotion of GM seeds. By noting that the pesticide industry is the principal advocate of IP in agriculture, we are able to cast contemporary debates over IP into a longer history of intervention in, and representation of, the third world in attempts to secure hegemony over visions of sustainable agriculture, in developing countries and developed.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Since its inception, the mission of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has been to spread the concept of intellectual property and the benefits of this system to the entire world. WIPO considers intellectual property laws to be the foundation of innovation and progress and thus a public good. Intellectual property is primarily a western concept and so an important goal of WIPO has been to educate and create the conditions for the acceptance of intellectual property throughout the global south. Current events suggest that WIPO must adapt to a considerably different world than the one into which it was born. Since the Trade Related Aspect of Intellectual Property Agreement (TRIPS) came into force as part of the WTO in 1995, the WTO has taken center stage in intellectual property disputes. In response, the global south has aligned against the strong intellectual property protection embodied in the TRIPS agreement. To add to the confusion of voices, UN agencies such as UNESCO and WHO and other international agreements such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) have entered into the intellectual property debate by making claims that intellectual property rights should not trump health care, human rights, or environmental protection. Ultimately, as the world wakes up to the negative impacts of strong intellectual property protection, WIPO's global role has come into question.In response to the changing landscape, WIPO has become the center of a 'development' agenda that seeks to increase transparency and accessibility to member countries from the developing world and from NGOs representing their interests. As WIPO seeks to remain relevant in the post-WTO world, it has become the center of several debates whose trajectories could undermine the very concept of intellectual property. In this paper I would like to examine WIPO?s past and its future and argument that WIPO could become a forum that gives voice to a new intellectual property paradigm that takes into consideration the needs of its global south constituencies.First, I'll detail the history of WIPO and how it has traditionally defined its mission. Second, I will look to the ways in which WIPO has altered (or resisted altering) its identity to deal with pressing contemporary issues. Specifically, I'd like to look at the work WIPO is doing on issues of traditional knowledge. Finally, I'd like to make recommendations for how WIPO should consider its future in the context of the development round agenda and t he issues raised by the global south.