Silent Theft: The Private Plunder of Our Common Wealth

Until a 1998 federal court decision, a Minnesota publisher claimed to own every federal court decision, including Roe v. Wade and Brown v. Board of Education. A Texas company was recently allowed to claim a patent on basmati rice, a kind of rice grown in India for hundreds of years. The Mining Act of 1872 is still in effect, allowing companies to buy land from the US government at $5 acre if they plan to mine it. These are resources that belong to American citizens, yet they are being given away to companies with anything but the common interest in mind. Where wasthe public outcry, or the government intervention, when these were happening? The answers are alarming. Private corporations are consuming the resources at a staggering rate that the American people collectively own, and the government is not protecting the commons on their behalf. In Silent Theft, David Bollier exposes the audacious attempts of companies to appropriate medical breakthroughs, public airwaves, outer space, state research, and even the DNA of plants and animals. Amazingly, these abuses often go unnoticed, Bollier argues, because people have lost the ability to see the commons.