Abstract:
The role of Knowledge is still epistemologically ambiguous in economic
discourse which has dominated management praxis for the last thirty years. Both
discourse and praxis have been less prone to scrutinizing the current use/abuse in
the patenting of “life” and in the economic “harvesting" of people in the
commerce of life, health and death.
The strategic importance of patents to Knowledge Management in a globalizing
economy is under-stated as are the ethical, regulatory and inter-generational
questions that need scrutiny in the privatization of human inheritance and the
associated role that current, and future, “body shops” do, and will, play.
