Landgrab for life and matter

David Bollier re-iterates his concerns about the patent landgrab going on in the area of biotechnology at his On the Commons blog.

"This trend is not receiving much notice, but the “ownership society” is quietly making some very deep inroads indeed. A fierce land grab is now underway to own and control some of the most basic building blocks of life and matter. These include man-made genomes of artificial species, purified versions of elements of the Periodic Table, nano-scale formulations of medicinal herbs, genetically created hybrids of living and non-living matter, and much else. ("Nano" refers to atomic- and molecular-level biological and material technologies; one nanometer equals one billionth of a meter.)...

The more basic question, of course, is whether the commons of nature and life should be converted into commodities for the marketplace in the first place. Why should high-tech entrepreneurs be allowed to own proprietary knockoffs of nature on which we all have a legitimate moral claim, as human beings. And what about non-human life and its claims on the elements of nature? The very act of ownership implies that patented materials can be severed without consequence from their niche in the web of nature. The history of markets demonstrates, moreover, that a proprietary surrogate of nature may well disrupt and destabilize natural processes in unpredictable ways – which is why extreme care and public scrutiny are needed...

The implicit moral issue in all of these developments, it seems to me, is whether market norms will govern the debate – or whether a deeper, more humanistic and ecological perspective will prevail. Right now, the property-rights, free-market boosters have the field to themselves, and the commons is hardly in sight. This is very troubling."