Common Knowledge: How Access to Knowledge and Ideas Can Drive Development

This 8-page media brief, produced jointly by Panos London and Yale University, outlines the key arguments supporting more open access to knowledge as a tool for development in developing countries. It looks at examples in key sectors where knowledge plays a critical role in shaping and influencing people's lives. It also attempts to examine the meaning behind the jargon used in the industry to help better inform public debate around knowledge for development.


The document explains 'intellectual property' as "a legal device that gives exclusive rights to creations of the mind, including literary works, designs, and discoveries." Though commonly assumed to be limited to patents protecting inventions and copyrights protecting creators, inventors, and discoverers, some people argue that intellectual property rights can also help the systematic development of public knowledge. Members of the Access to Knowledge movement (A2K) aim to "change the way knowledge is regulated across various sectors worldwide, and challenge the extent of intellectual property. A2K seeks large-scale changes in the information- and knowledge-sharing aspects of policies in sectors such as information technology, broadcasting, agriculture, health, education and publicly funded academic and scientific research." They advocate for knowledge to be regarded as a means to further social and economic development of all countries, rather than as a means to profit.


The article explains the A2K approach to balancing intellectual property laws and the international context of intellectual property politics. A2K supports open source, as opposed to proprietary software, for example, and asks that the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), which oversees treaties on intellectual property rights, "embrace explicitly new development goals... which would make economic growth in developing countries an explicit component of its mission." In addition, the World Trade Organization (WTO) agreement on trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights (TRIPS) intends to globally harmonise intellectual property protection, and, as stated here, could support developing countries, as it does in allowing for access to generic versions of branded drugs.


In its discussion of accessing scientific knowledge for development, the document focuses attention on scholarly journals which require transferring the intellectual property rights of authors to publishers as a precondition for publishing in academic journals. Because much of the research in the journals is publicly funded, the argument is made that public money is 'subsidising' the scholarly media industry, which profits from payment by those who wish to access the knowledge. Regarding the A2K stance, "[a] diverse collection of A2K voices is promoting ‘open access publishing’, through which web-based journals operated by non-profit organisations can select their own articles for publication through a peer-review process, and make them freely available. Several scientific disciplines are in the midst of successful experiments in open access publishing, including the Public Library of Science in the field of biology and medicine." Problems of open access journals include sustainable funding, quality-checking and editing research findings, and a lack of support and recognition from academic peer groups and government bodies.


The document concludes with questions and story ideas for journalists and a section on what journalists can do to bring stories to the public in an understandable manner. The recommendation here is for journalists to use the A2K debate to help the public understand the issues of the international intellectual property system and its links to access to knowledge for human development.