ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the shape of the Development Agenda and explores its political significance. The Development Agenda originated in a proposal that Argentina and Brazil informally circulated to the members of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) at the beginning of September 2004, for the then imminent WIPO General Assembly. The key demand of the Development Agenda is to reestablish, at the global level, the traditional public policy aspects of intellectual property. The shift of intellectual property rights (IPRs) up the global political agenda has prompted a more detailed critical engagement with the mechanisms of global regulation around intellectual property; the Development Agenda is therefore not an isolated critique of the global system of IPRs. The Development Agenda focuses on an assertion that has been central to the WIPO's practices: that the WIPO exists to "promote intellectual property" through technical/legal support of its members.
