Papers

May 5, 2009

Knowledge as a Global Public Good

Type Book Excerpt
Author(s) Joseph Stiglitz
University Professor
Department of Economics
Columbia University

In this chapter, Joseph Stiglitz outlines the concept of global public goods. He argues that knowledge is one such public good because it is non-rivalrous and non-exclusive. Knowledge also benefits development and increases private and public capital. Finally, Stiglitz highlights the implications of knowledge considering as a global public good for the international intellectual property rights regime.

This paper was originally published in Global Public Goods: International Cooperation in the 21st Century, Inge Kaul, Isabelle Grunberg, Marc A. Stern (eds.), United Nations Development Programme, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999, pp. 308-325. Also published in International Intellectual Property in an Integrated World Economy, F. Abbot, T. Cottier, and F. Gurry, eds., Aspen Publishers, 2007.