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Current calls for the global North’s to provide affordable covid vaccine shots to the global South through licenses and tech-transfer programs has triggered a new and intriguing reframing of the notion of responsibility by the pharmaceutical industry. The assumption is that the present will repeat itself, and that we need to be ready for those scenarios even though that may come with human costs in the present. In fact, pharmaceutical industry spokespersons have been arguing that the global north is not responsible for the health needs of the global south, but for those of future global subjects. Loudly affirming responsibility to future generations is applied as an ethical-looking veneer over the rejection of responsibility to present patients in actual need. If the global South’s calls for compulsory licensing of vaccine patents were to be accepted, that would destabilize the present pharmaceutical innovation ecology by showing that IP rights could be arbitrarily weakened or suspended. In turn, this would scare away venture capital, thus starving the R+D ecosystem. Accordingly, acting on the belief that the global north has any responsibility for the health of the global south will have irresponsible, fatal consequences. Today’s unvaccinated masses demanding affordable shots are thus “selfish” – a “special interest” group insensitive and irresponsible to the needs of a much larger number of future global citizens, from the North or South alike. The path to future global health is obstructed not by corporate greed but by the demands of today’s poor.
Mario Biagioli is a Distinguished Professor of Law and Communication at UCLA. Dr. Biagioli’s scholarship is at the intersection of intellectual property and science and technology studies. He was previously a Distinguished Professor in the School of Law, the STS Program, and the Department of History at UC Davis, where he was the founding director for the Center for Science and Innovation Studies, and an Associate faculty member of the Cultural Studies Program and the Critical Theory Program. He is the author of eight books, his most recent publication Gaming the Metrics: New Ecologies of Academic Misconduct was published by MIT Press in 2020. He is currently completing a book on the new forms of scientific fraud and misconduct that are spawn by the introduction of metrics of academic evaluation. Other interests include patentable subject matter, the history of the idea/expression divide, and the role of eyewitnessing in science. [Biography sourced from UCLA Law].
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About this event
This event is part of Creative IPR's and History of Capitalism's series of open seminars. This is a public research seminar bringing together researchers and other professionals from across the social sciences, law, the humanities and beyond to present their research or field of expertise followed by a Q&A session.
As of 2022, seminars will be hybrid with the option to attend on Zoom and in person. The seminars are open to all, but advanced registration is required.