Trading the Genome

Zusatztext

Gemeinden, Städte und Kreise erfüllen ein breites Aufgabenspektrum. Die erfolgreiche Bewältigung dieser Aufgaben erfordert Gemeindestrukturen mit ausreichender Flächenausdehnung, entsprechender Finanzkraft sowie Planungen, die über kommunale Grenzen hinausgehen. Dabei sollen gleichzeitig das vielfältige eigene Gemeindeleben und gewachsene Strukturen erhalten bleiben. Auch der Aufbau der kommunalen Selbstverwaltung in den neuen Bundesländern setzt wegen der dort vorhandenen kleinräumigen Struktur und der geringen Einwohnerdichte eine Zusammenarbeit der Gemeinden voraus. Ebenso vielfältig wie Aufgaben und Anforderungen sind die Lösungswege. Die Alternativen haben sich insbesondere in der umfassenden Gebiets- und Verwaltungsreform in den 60er und 70er Jahren entwickelt. Neben der Bildung großer Einheitsgemeinden gibt es weitgehend kodifizierte Verbandsmodelle sowie freier zu gestaltende Kooperationen und freiwillige Vereinbarungen. Welches Modell im Einzelfall im Betracht kommt, ist zunächst abhängig vom jeweiligen Landesgesetzgeber, der bestimmte Typen gemeindlicher Kooperationsformen vorgibt. Bei der Entscheidung vor Ort spielen dann auch andere Faktoren eine Rolle wie z.B. Zweck, Problemstellung, Flexibilität, Zeit oder örtliche Besonderheiten. Die Neuerscheinung gibt nicht nur praktische Entscheidungshilfen, sondern enthält im umfangreichen Anhang vielfältige Muster für eine Geschäftsordnung, für Verbandssatzungen und für eine öffentlich-rechtliche Vereinbarung.

Auteur
Bronwyn Parry

Texte du rabat

Major changes in scientific, technological, and regulatory domains have fundamentally altered the way collected biological materials are used industrially. New technological artifacts are being created -- cell lines, cryogenically stored tissue samples, biochemical extracts, and even sequenced DNA stored on databases -- each of which contains highly sought after genetic and biochemical information. Able to be cloned, copied, synthesized and engineered, rented, downloaded, viewed, and exchanged, these bio-informational "proxies" may be transacted thousands of times in any given month or year. The result is an extremely lucrative, albeit largely invisible, resource economy in bio-information.

But who will benefit from this new trade? Many suppliers of the genetic and biochemical resources from which this information is drawn come from economically vulnerable developing countries. The Biodiversity Convention obliges signatory states to ensure that suppliers of genetic and biochemical resources receive "a just and equitable" share of the profits that accrue from the commercialization of their resources -- but it is not clear that they do. In a groundbreaking work that draws on anthropology, history, philosophy, business, and law, Bronwyn Parry links a firsthand investigation of the operation of the bioprospecting industry to a sophisticated analysis of broader economic, regulatory, and technological transformations: the rise of an information economy, global intellectual property rights and benefit-sharing regimes, and the progressive molecularization of approaches to biological research. Parry reveals how a failure to monitor this new global trade in bio-information could have potentially disastrous consequences for the suppliers of genetic and biochemical resources -- transforming the complex dynamics of collecting, as well as the politics and practice of biological resource exploitation.

Résumé
In a groundbreaking work that draws on anthropology, history, philosophy, business and law, Parry links firsthand knowledge of the operation of the bioprospecting industry to a sophisticated analysis of broader economic, regulatory, and technological transformations to reveal the complex economic and political dynamics that underpin the new global trade in bio-information.

Contenu

Part 1: Introduction Part 2. The Collection of Nature and the Nature of Collecting Revealing the Social and Spatial Dynamics of Collecting Collecting as Simple Acquisition: Decontextualization and Exoticization Collection as Concentration and Control Collection as Recirculation and Regulation New World Collectors Part 3: Speedup: Accelerating the Social and Spatial Dynamics of Collecting Retheorizing Life Forms: Material and Informational? The Rise of the Information and Bio-Information Economies Emerging Markets: The Regulation of Trade in Bio-Information Part 4: New Collectors, New Collections "When the world was a kinder and gentler place": Early Players and Vacation Pursuits "An historic revival of collecting" Impetus for the Revival: Technological Change The Biodiversity Convention: New Protocols and New Rationales GATT TRIPs: New Protections, New Incentives The Practice and Process of Collecting Part 5: The Fate of the Collections From Reproduction to Replication "Build it for us" Combinations and Permutations The Diminishing Role of in situ Collecting The Advent of Microsourcing Re-mining ex situ Collections The Emerging Trade in Collected Genetic and Biochemical Materials Hire Plants: Renters and Brokers Transacting Bio-Information: Licensing and "Pay-per-View" Part 6: Taming the Slippery Beast: Regulating Trade in Bio-Information Compensatory Agreements: The Rise of a Proto-Universal Culture of Regulation? Networks, Capillaries, and the Geography of Knowledge Systems Compensatory Agreements: Investigating Terms and Conditions Infrastructural Support and Technical Training Future Benefits: Royalty Payments Taming the Slippery Beast Regulating the Unlicensed Copying of Bio-Information Concentration and Control: Patenting Collected Materials The Complexities of "Co-Inventorship" Part 7: Back to the Future