Article,
Colonial Copyright, Postcolonial Publics : the Berne Convention and the 1967 Stockholm Diplomatic Conference Revisited
SCRIPTed : A Journal of Law, Technology & Society, 7 (3): 532--550 (2010)
DOI: DOI: 10.2966/scrip.070310.532
Abstract
In the annals of international copyright history—by and large synonymous with the
Berne Union and the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic
Works—translation occupies a contested space. At the end of the nineteenth century,
as the nascent Convention tried to come to terms with the legal ramifications of
translation and the way it challenged the perceived stability of the work, translation
also acted as a conduit for geopolitical tensions between producer/user-nations. A
conflict native to the Convention, the dichotomy between export/import and
developed/developing nations returned with a vengeance during the calamitous
Stockholm Revision Conference in 1967. In the following, I revisit this critical
juncture in international copyright history to consider the divergent claims and
counter-claims relating to translation and the dissemination of knowledge. The
purpose of this essay is to contribute to a historically informed understanding of
current processes surrounding the construction, dissemination and control of
knowledge, as they materialise, for instance, in the WIPO Development Agenda.
