American University Awarded $3.8 Million Grant from Arcadia Fund to Promote International Right to Research in Copyright Law

WASHINGTON, Dec. 16, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- American University Washington College of Law (AUWCL) has received a three-year grant of $3.8 million from Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin, for its Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property (PIJIP). The project will study changes needed in international copyright policy to ensure equity in the production of and access to research.

"The COVID pandemic has cast a bright light on inequities in the global research system that restrictive copyright laws perpetuate," said Sean Flynn, Director of the Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property and the project's principal investigator. "In many countries, library resources, for example, can only be used 'on the premises' of that institution. Our goal is to promote a system in which every researcher, every student, and every citizen of every country has the ability to engage in modern research activity and enjoy its products, including across borders and utilizing online tools."

The project will produce research, provide training to a global network of change makers, and connect a world-wide network of experts to a global community of researchers, libraries, museums, archives, and digital rights activists currently active in international copyright policy making.

Arcadia's open access program supports work that "improves access to human knowledge and helps make information free for anyone, anywhere to access and use, now and in the future."

A Steering Committee of top copyright experts from around the world will guide its research activities. The project will work with a broad range of civil society partners representing researchers and the institutions that serve them, including: International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions; Creative Commons, Inc.; Wikimedia Deutschland; Karisma (Colombia); Electronic Information for Libraries (EIFL); Communia Association (EU); Center for Internet and Society (India); and Knowledge Ecology International (U.S. and Geneva).

For more information about the Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property, visit pijip.org.

CONTACTS:

SOURCE American University Washington College of Law

Related Links

https://www.wcl.american.edu