From poverty to power - Oxfam-Québec

2 POWER AND POLITICS I SURF, THEREFORE I AMUnless regulated by governments, private sector-driven R&D islikely to widen the technological divide between ‘haves’ and ‘havenots’.An effective state, motivated and supported by other actors,could reorient the focus of technological development towards theneeds of poor people by regulating research and funding of highereducation and R&D. Active citizens, in both North and South, couldcontribute to this outcome by pressuring private companies and statesto include poor people in the benefits of new technology.Above all, the emphasis must be on the development of ‘appropriatetechnologies’, which address the needs of the poorest and mostexcluded people, and respect the sustainability of the ecosystem uponwhich they depend. India’s M.S. Swaminathan, winner of the 1987World Food Prize, applied Mahatma Gandhi’s words to this point:‘Recall the face of the poorest and the weakest person you have seen,and ask yourself, if the steps you contemplate are going to be of any useto him.’ 67Besides reorienting the focus of global R&D, developing countriesface the challenge of developing their own capacities to create knowledge,which are stymied today by the flight of qualified professionals, luredaway by better pay and working conditions in wealthy countries.Unless this global problem is addressed, the higher-education systemsof developing countries will continue running up a down escalator inorder to build their science base. The issue of migration is taken up indetail in Part 5.More worrying even than the brain drain is an emerging patternof global governance of knowledge that is biased against poor peopleand poor countries. Enshrined in ‘intellectual property rights’ (IPR)legislation at both national and global levels, increasingly aggressiveIP rules drastically reduce the flow of technology to poor countries,while requiring them to waste scarce funds and personnel on administeringa regime that only benefits foreign companies. By inflating theprice of all technology-rich products, the IP regime constitutes aharmful tax on economic development. Like migration, this problemis addressed in Part 5.57