The articles collected in this special issue aim at addressing the debate about the protection and use of cultural heritage in the Pacific within the context of globalization. Contributions aim specifically at analyzing the tension that exists between, on the one hand, political, legal and economic discourses of Pacific peoples who wish to retain control and who seek protection of the use of their cultural heritage, and, on the other hand, the view of others arguing that it is in the interest of the general public to lift as many embargos as possible in order to stimulate research and to increase economic growth. All authors approach the subject of cultural and intellectual property rights as a discourse, with specific attention for the concepts of property and ownership, particularly in relation to cultural heritage and cultural knowledge; the potential benefits of property; appropriate protection mechanisms; the complexities of the discourses about rights, especially property rights; the appropriation of property or its misappropriation, often associated with what is freely available in the public domain; and, finally, the use of intellectual property as either a form of enclosure or as a form of ethnic boundary.

In a rapidly globalizing world, indigenous knowledge is in mortal danger, and it will require new forms of intellectual property protection to save it. There are fundamental incongruities between Western intellectual property law and indigenous knowledge that prevent the current international intellectual property framework from fully comprehending or addressing the contexts and needs of indigenous knowledge. This article will review the history of international and regional initiatives to develop protection for indigenous knowledge. It will consider the geopolitical context that has informed discussions about protecting the intangible wealth of indigenous peoples, including the recent addition of articulate and impassioned indigenous voices to the conversation. Finally, this article will discuss some of the concerns that have been raised about subjecting indigenous knowledge to a system of formal legal regulation.

Intellectual property claims have long been sustained in a way that is now under severe scrutiny. Pacific Island countries continue to face unauthorized uses of their traditional knowledge and practices. In response, international agencies in collaboration with Pacific Island countries are promoting sui generis forms of protection. The Institute of Fijian Language and Culture's Cultural Mapping Programme looks beyond ongoing debates about indigenous collection and digitization of intangible heritage to promote sui generis protection measures in lieu of western intellectual property law. Supported by an Institute grant, the unfolding Sawau Project creates an archive of sites, stories, and shared memories of the Sawau people of Beqa, an island iconic in Fiji for its firewalking practice (vilavilairevo). Advocating a form of social intervention in situ, The Sawau Project has become a collaborative tool to encourage digital documentation, linkages, and institutional collaborations among Fijian communities and their allies to negotiate and promote alternative forms of protection.

This discussion reviews the differences between traditional Micronesian principles regarding traditional knowledge, or ‘esoteric’ knowledge, and Western copyright laws, which have been used in the expropriation and legal alienation of traditional knowledge. We consider this conflict in relation to contemporary Native American intellectual property issues and tribal responses for the protection of such knowledge and to control research activities. This is compared with the recent international and Pacific Islands governments' concerns and actions regarding commodification and misappropriation of traditional knowledge, including the new Pacific Model Law. Finally, we review the nature of traditional knowledge in Chuuk State and its current status and recommend specific steps that the Federated States of Micronesia might take legislatively to protect traditional knowledge as part of its significant cultural heritage.

Cultural property activists have worried about the bioprospecting, or even biopiracy, of kava (Piper methysticum), a plant exchanged and consumed for many Pacific social and ritual purposes. By the 1990s, kava and concoctions made from the plant's component kavalactones were increasingly popular products within global markets for recreational and medicinal drugs. Starting in 2002, however, a number of European countries among others banned kava imports after initial reports that some heavy users suffered liver damage. This has complicated the kava story as producer efforts shifted from protecting rights to the plant to reopening blocked export markets. The difficulty is to both push kava into global markets while protecting local rights to the plant. A promising strategy may be developing consumer awareness of geographic indicators and “noble” kava varieties that Vanuatu's local producers may control yet globally market as “the best in the world.”

Ownership is often understood merely as a function of social relations, that is, it emerges merely because of the relations between people with respect to the things that they own. Concomitantly ownership is also seen as being dependent upon creativity to bring its force into motion. Far from dismissing such a view of ownership, it is acknowledged that such a view possibly comes from a world that is preoccupied with creativity. This discussion aims to show a particular kind of dialectic between creativity and ownership that underlies discourses about intellectual property especially in countries like Papua New Guinea. Through an ethnographic concern with personal names and their attendant claims to ownership and creativity, this paper aims to show how two trajectories of ownership co-exist in a Papua New Guinea society.

Michael Brown famously asked ‘Who owns native culture?’ This paper revisits that question by analyzing what happens to culture when the culturally defined boundary between it and nature becomes salient in the context of disputes between indigenous and settler populations. My case study is the dispute between the New Zealand government and Maori tribal groupings concerning ownership of the foreshore and seabed. Having been granted the right to test their claims in court in 2003, Maori groups were enraged when the government legislated the right out of existence in 2004. Though the reasons for doing so were clearly political, contrasting cultural assumptions appeared to set Maori and Pakeha (New Zealanders of European origin) at odds. While couching ownership of part of nature as an IPR issue may seem counter-intuitive, I argue that as soon as a property claim destabilizes the nature/culture boundary, IPR discourse becomes pertinent.

This article questions and contextualizes the emergence of a discourse of intellectual property rights in Māori society. It is argued that Māori claims regarding intellectual property function primarily to demarcate ethnic boundaries between Māori and non-Māori. Māori consider the reinforcement of ethnic boundaries necessary since they experience their society and distinctive way of life as endangered both by the foreign consumption or misappropriation of aspects of their authentic cultural forms and by the intrusion of foreign cultural elements. Following Simon Harrison (1999) it is argued that the first threat is often represented as an undesired form of cultural appropriation, piracy or theft, while the second threat is viewed as a form of cultural pollution. This argument is elaborated with a case-study of each so-called danger, namely a claim regarding native flora and fauna submitted to the Waitangi Tribunal, which is considered as an example of resistance against cultural appropriation, and the increasing hostility of Māori to foreign interest and research in Māori culture and society, which is analysed as an example of opposition to putative pollution.

The articles in this special issue on intellectual property in the Pacific document anxieties about culture and tradition, and about the intrusion of ideas of property into previously uncommodified areas of peoples' lives. These include fears that traditional knowledge and skills are not being passed on to young people (Nason and Peter; Pigliasco); that migrants in a globalized world will take aspects of culture with them when they leave (Nason and Peter); that anthropologists and other scholars will wrongfully appropriate and use aspects of the cultures they study for their own benefit (Van Meijl); and that profits from the commercialization of traditional knowledge, practices, and products will not go to the people who consider themselves their owners and caretakers (Lindstrom). In addition, Jo Recht's contribution provides a discussion of attempts to protect culture and tradition through international conventions and national laws. Finally, Andrew Moutu and Michael Goldsmith describe claims of ownership over aspects of nature to reflect on fundamental aspects of intellectual property and ownership more generally.