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15.3 (Fall 1991) Intellectual Property Rights: The Politics of Ownership

A Decade of Cultural Survival Quarterly

With this issues, Cultural Survival Quarterly begins its tenth year. And in 1992, Cultural Survival, Inc, will be twenty. Over these time spans, the magazine and the organization have come into their own, making this a fit time to reflect on where we have come and where we are going.

For a decade, CSQ has been Cultural Survival's face to the world Quarterly have changed US, British, French, Canadian, and German policies toward such countries as Ethiopia, Guatemala, Peru, Sudan, and Uganda.

The Source of Our Cures: A new pharmaceutical company wants to provide reciprocal benefits and recognize the value of indigenous

The Source of Our Cures: A new pharmaceutical company wants to provide. reciprocal benefits and recognize the value of indigenous knowledge

FOR 500 YEARS, SINCE THE People of South America encountered Europeans on their soil, the global pharmacopoeia has been enriched by a number of important plant-derived medicines discovered and utilized by indigenous people.

The skeletal muscle relaxant d-tubocurarine is derived from an Amazonian arrow poison better known as curare, Chonodendron tomentosum.

The Fabric of Life: Repatriating the sacred Coroma textiles

IN FEBRUARY 1988 PIO CRUZ AND Cristina Bubba, representatives of the Aymara community of Coroma, Bolivia, arrived in San Francisco. Their presence symbolized one step in process that their community had initiated to locate and ultimately return sacred textiles that had been "removed" (i.e., stolen) from their community beginning in the late 1970s.

The Antiquities of Nepal: It is time to start listening to communities whose possessions have become objects of international co

The Antiquities of Nepal: It is time to start listening to communities. whose possessions have become objects of international consumption

It is not seemly nor of good report

That thieves at home must hang, but he that puts

Into his overgorged and bloated purse

The wealth of Indian nations, escapes.

TO CONSIDER THE ETHICS OF collecting cultural property is to consider what is good and bad or right and wrong, what is the moral duty and the obligation of the collector, or of the society which functions as collector.

Singing Other Peoples' Songs: Indigenous songs are often considered "public domain" -yet a mainstream musician can turn them int

Singing Other Peoples' Songs: Indigenous songs are often considered. "public domain"-yet a mainstream musician can turn them into "individual property"

WHEN MY WIFE, JUDY, AND I were doing field research among the Suy Indians in Mato Grosso, Brazil, we all sang together a lot. Between 1970 and 1982 the Suy learned many of our songs - just as they had learned the songs of more than 10 "foreign" cultures before we appeared - and we sang theirs.

Power and Patronage in the Philippines: Environmental and cultural survival in Palawan Province

Power and Patronage in the Philippines: Environmental and cultural. survival in Palawan Province

IT IS NOT SURPRISING THAT Organizations concerned with the environment, conservation, and human rights are converging on a common strategy to protect both natural resources and cultural groups in tropical forest ecosystems. The strategy involves obtaining legal rights for ethnic groups to the land and resources on which they have traditionally depended. The idea is that the traditional owners of the land will, as they always have, manage the resources sensibly and sustainably.

Oasis of Hope: Sahrawi refugee camps in Western Sahara bear the fruits of self-sufficiency amid a harsh environment

Oasis of Hope: Sahrawi refugee camps in Western Sahara bear the fruits of. self-sufficiency amid a harsh environment

THE SAHRAWIS OF WESTERN Sahara are an indigenous African people hardly known in the West. There have been no televised-music concerts nor front-page news stories on their plight. Yet this desert nation has persevered.

No Hunting! Biodiversity, indigenous rights, and scientific poaching

IN A RECENT ARTICLE, THE Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes denounced the US invasion of Panama as the Bush Administration's declaration of its intent to hunt whomever, whatever, and wherever it likes in Latin America. Fuentes warned, "If we do not post `No Hunting' signs, our lands will be poached on. We must set up our signs quickly and be prepared to enforce them with prudence and a firm will."

Of course, the United States has been stalking political prey in Latin America for many years now.

Local Politics, Global Politics

Nineteen ninety-two promises to be a turning point in national and international politics. Here in the United States, a presidential campaign will take a place at a time when revolutionary changes are sweeping the international community. The quality of life for working and middle class citizens is in rapid decline. US foreign and domestic policies face unprecedented challenges in addressing pressing environmental, economic, and social agendas.

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