Reclaiming the Commons (Biodiversity, Traditional Knowledge, and the Rights of Mother Earth)

Reclaiming the Commons: In Defense of Biodiversity and Traditional Knowledge lays out the scientific, legal, political, and cultural struggle to defend the sovereignty of biodiversity and indigenous knowledge. Corporate war on nature and people through patents and corporate Intellectual Property Rights has unleashed an epidemic of biopiracy, including important legal battles of fighting efforts to patent the rights to plants including neem, wheat, and basmati which are synthesized in this book. It is the first detailed legal history of the international and national laws related to biodiversity and Intellectual Property Rights.