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[andrew garton <agarton AT toysatellite.org>]

Dear colleagues,

In about 12-14 hours the following position paper, prepared in
collaboration with the Association for Progressive Communications, of
which I'm an Australian based representative of, will be presented at
the WIPO General Assembly.

We are collecting endorsements from individuals and/or
organisations. If you are interested, please send an email to:
geneva_declaration AT cptech.org.

All documents and background materials are here:
http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/genevadeclaration.html

---

Geneva Declaration on the Future of the World Intellectual Property
Organization

Humanity faces a global crisis in the governance of knowledge, technology and
culture.  The crisis is manifest in many ways. 

Without access to essential medicines, millions suffer and die;
Morally repugnant inequality of access to education, knowledge and technology
undermines development and social cohesion;
Anticompetitive practices in the knowledge economy impose enormous costs on
consumers and retard innovation;
Authors, artists and inventors face mounting barriers to follow-on innovation;
Concentrated ownership and control of knowledge, technology, biological
resources and culture harm development, diversity and democratic institutions;
Technological measures designed to enforce intellectual property rights in
digital environments threaten core exceptions in copyright laws for disabled
persons, libraries, educators, authors and consumers, and undermine privacy
and freedom;
Key mechanisms to compensate and support creative individuals and communities
are unfair to both creative persons and consumers;
Private interests misappropriate social and public goods, and lock up the
public domain. 

At the same time, there are astoundingly promising innovations in
information, medical and other essential technologies, as well as in social
movements and business models.  We are witnessing highly successful campaigns
for access to drugs for AIDS, scientific journals, genomic information and
other databases, and hundreds of innovative collaborative efforts to create
public goods, including the Internet, the World Wide Web, Wikipedia, the
Creative Commons, GNU Linux and other free and open software projects, as well
as distance education tools and medical research tools.  Technologies such as
Google now provide tens of millions with powerful tools to find information. 
Alternative compensation systems have been proposed to expand access and
interest in cultural works, while providing both artists and consumers with
efficient and fair systems for compensation.  There is renewed interest in
compensatory liability rules, innovation prizes, or competitive
intermediators, as models for economic incentives for science and technology
that can facilitate sequential follow-on innovation and avoid monopolist
abuses.  In 2001, the World Trade Organization (WTO) declared that member
countries should “promote access to medicines for all.” 

Humanity stands at a crossroads – a fork in our moral code and a test of our
ability to adapt and grow.   Will we evaluate, learn and profit from the best
of these new ideas and opportunities, or will we respond to the most
unimaginative pleas to suppress all of this in favor of intellectually weak,
ideologically rigid, and sometimes brutally unfair and inefficient policies? 
Much will depend upon the future direction of the World Intellectual Property
Organization (WIPO), a global body setting standards that regulate the
production, distribution and use of knowledge.

A 1967 Convention sought to encourage creative activity by establishing WIPO
to promote the protection of intellectual property.  The mission was expanded
in 1974, when WIPO became part of the United Nations, under an agreement that
asked WIPO to take “appropriate action to promote creative intellectual
activity,” and facilitate the transfer of technology to developing countries,
“in order to accelerate economic, social and cultural development.”    

As an intergovernmental organization, however, WIPO embraced a culture of
creating and expanding monopoly privileges, often without regard to
consequences.  The continuous expansion of these privileges and their
enforcement mechanisms has led to grave social and economic costs, and has
hampered and threatened other important systems of creativity and innovation. 
WIPO needs to enable its members to understand the real economic and social
consequences of excessive intellectual property protections, and the
importance of striking a balance between the public domain and competition on
the one hand, and the realm of property rights on the other.  The mantras that
"more is better" or "that less is never good" are disingenuous and dangerous
-- and have greatly compromised the standing of WIPO, especially among experts
in intellectual property policy.  WIPO must change.  

We do not ask that WIPO abandon efforts to promote the appropriate protection
of intellectual property, or abandon all efforts to harmonize or improve these
laws.  But we insist that WIPO to work from the broader framework described in
the 1974 agreement with the UN, and to take a more balanced and realistic view
of the social benefits and costs of intellectual property rights as a tool,
but not the only tool, for supporting creativity intellectual activity.  

WIPO must also express a more balanced view of the relative benefits of
harmonization and diversity, and seek to impose global conformity only when it
truly benefits all of humanity.  A “one size fits all” approach that embraces
the highest levels of intellectual property protection for everyone leads to
unjust and burdensome outcomes for countries that are struggling to meet the
most basic needs of their citizens.

The WIPO General Assembly has now been asked to establish a development
agenda.  The initial proposal, first put forth by the governments of Argentina
and Brazil, would profoundly refashion the WIPO agenda toward development and
new approaches to support innovation and creativity.  This is a long overdue
and much needed first step toward a new WIPO mission and work program.  It is
not perfect.  The WIPO Convention should formally recognize the need to take
into account the “development needs of its Member States, particularly
developing countries and least-developed countries,” as has been proposed, but
this does not go far enough.  Some have argued that the WIPO should only
“promote the protection of intellectual property,” and not consider, any
policies that roll back intellectual property claims or protect and enhance
the public domain.  This limiting view stifles critical thinking.   Better
expressions of the mission can be found, including the requirement in the 1974
UN/WIPO agreement that WIPO “promote creative intellectual activity and
facilitate the transfer of technology related to industrial property.”  The
functions of WIPO should not only be to promote “efficient protection” and
“harmonization” of intellectual property laws, but to formally embrace the
notions of balance, appropriateness and the stimulation of both competitive
and collaborative models of creative activity within national, regional and
transnational systems of innovation. 

The proposal for a development agenda has created the first real opportunity
to debate the future of WIPO.  It is not only an agenda for developing
countries.  It is an agenda for everyone, North and South.  It must move
forward.  All nations and people must join and expand the debate on the future
of WIPO.

There must be a moratorium on new treaties and harmonization of standards
that expand and strengthen monopolies and further restrict access to
knowledge.  For generations WIPO has responded primarily to the narrow
concerns of powerful publishers, pharmaceutical manufacturers, plant breeders
and other commercial interests.  Recently, WIPO has become more open to civil
society and public interest groups, and this openness is welcome.  But WIPO
must now address the substantive concerns of these groups, such as the
protection of consumer rights and human rights.  Long-neglected concerns of
the poor, the sick, the visually impaired and others must be given priority. 

The proposed development agenda points in the right direction.  By stopping
efforts to adopt new treaties on substantive patent law, broadcasters rights
and databases, WIPO will create space to address far more urgent needs.  

The proposals for the creation of standing committees and working groups on
technology transfer and development are welcome.  WIPO should also consider
the creation of one or more bodies to systematically address the control of
anticompetitive practices and the protection of consumer rights.

We support the call for a Treaty on Access to Knowledge and Technology.  The
Standing Committee on Patents and the Standing Committee on Copyright and
Related Rights should solicit views from member countries and the public on
elements of such a treaty.

The WIPO technical assistance programs must be fundamentally reformed. 
Developing countries must have the tools to implement the WTO Doha Declaration
on TRIPS and Public Health, and “use, to the full” the flexibilities in the
TRIPS to “promote access to medicines for all.”  WIPO must help developing
countries address the limitations and exceptions in patent and copyright laws
that are essential for fairness, development and innovation.  If the WIPO
Secretariat cannot understand the concerns and represent the interests of the
poor, the entire technical assistance program should be moved to an
independent body that is accountable to developing countries.

Enormous differences in bargaining power lead to unfair outcomes between
creative individuals and communities (both modern and traditional) and the
commercial entities that sell culture and knowledge goods.  WIPO must honor
and support creative individuals and communities by investigating the nature
of relevant unfair business practices, and promote best practice models and
reforms that protect creative individuals and communities in these situations,
consistent with norms of the relevant communities.

Delegations representing the WIPO member states and the WIPO Secretariat have
been asked to choose a future.  We want a change of direction, new priorities,
and better outcomes for humanity.  We cannot wait for another generation.  It
is time to seize the moment and move forward.

---

---

Andrew Garton

c2o/Toy Satellite
PO BOX 1681
Collingwood, 3066, Australia

T/F +61 (0) 3 9417 5425

ag AT toysatellite.org
http://c2o.org/
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