Working Paper III. Today at the World Intellectual Property Organization negotiations are being held that could, if there was the political will, establish a new international intellectual property legal instrument requiring that patents that start life from the contributions of poor indigenous traditional communities be only awarded if procedures designed to benefit these communities have been complied with.
This study argues the case from the perspective of the Catholic Church that developed countries should join developing countries in a spirit of solidarity to embrace the changes being proposed by the latter to the international patent system, seeing these changes as advancing the ultimate purpose of an international intellectual property regime, namely serving the universal common good and not just private or national interests.
