Patenting Lives. Life Patents, Culture and Development Gibson, J. (ed.) Hampshire: Ashgate

Intellectual property (IP) is a hot issue now, just as land as property was 400 years ago with the beginning of capitalism. Does this mean that we are indeed in a new phase of modernity, in which knowledge is becoming a commodity? The international struggles over IP started, however, with very different stakeholders, like worlddominating governments and huge (mostly pharmaceutical) companies. Where in the earlier struggle landless farmers protested, in this phase the criticism comes from scientists, NGOs, some governments and (smaller) companies, and intellectuals. In the meantime, the number of patents is increasing rapidly all over the world, as is the number of patent offices and officers.