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For review copies, contact: Judi Rizzi, cipany@igc.org  
                                                                    

For Immediate Release
1-800-316-2739 or 914-271-6500.                                                                         
November 15, 2006
For all other inqueries, contact Ward Morehouse,

Apex Press Publisher,  ward@cipa-apex.org, 413-584-9642.
 
In "The Rule of Property," Karen Coulter offers a groundbreaking new perspective on the rise of private property over the public domain by linking two popular streams of thought and action: the legal history of the rise of corporate power developed by POCLAD (Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy) together with a growing debate about corporate encroachment on the ecological and social commons. Coulter, a member of POCLAD, is also a forest activist who watchdogs public lands against corporate theft.
 
Corporations are taking over public lands to build on, clear-cutting forests in national parks, acquiring public water systems for private profit, using the results of research paid for by public funds to develop products that they privatize.  It seems as though it has always been this way.  Not so, says Karen Coulter, Director of the Blue Mountain Biodiversity Project.
 
And in "The Rule of Property," she shows us how private interests, and increasingly, corporations, have been taking over the public domain -- the commons.  Since before the American Revolution, corporations have been laying claim to the commons including government-owned property, natural systems (e.g. oceans and atmosphere), community gardens, land trusts and Linux computer software, public libraries and scientific knowledge and cultural traditions.
 
"The conflict between individual property rights and the struggle for democracy has gone on for centuries ... and continues today," explains Coulter. The concept of private property has been developed to disguise this takeover of the commons.  In "The Rule of Property" we see the methodical development of private property rights by "the haves" and the simultaneous diminution of the commons.
 
In this historically illustrated pamphlet, Coulter examines the struggles surrounding these takings in order to suggest a way out.  "We need to tell others the hidden history of structured inequality and commons enclosure in order to dislodge the deeply held assumptions about property that allow private property rights to dominate all other social and ecological concerns.
 
The first in a new "Real Democracy Pamphlet Series," "The Rule of Property" is being published by The Apex Press in cooperation with POCLAD. Coulter’s pamphlet is an easily accessible introduction to the history and current situation regarding corporate takeover of our common heritage and is illustrated with historical and contemporary cartoons and drawings.

Advance Praise for "The Rule of Property"
 
A provocative, historically-grounded and readable examination of corporate encroachment on the ecological and social commons. A spirited call to reject the corporate enclosure of water, the internet, seeds, culture -- and everything else that belongs to all of us.
--Chuck Collins, Institute for Policy Studies, co-author of "Economic Apartheid in America"
 
This wonderful essay challenges conventional ways of defining property and points the way toward building a real democracy. Karen Coulter reminds us of just how urgent it is for us to confront those who want to make private property supreme over the public good.
-- Jim Hightower, nationally-syndicated commentator, public speaker, and best-selling author
 
Radicalism and pamphleteering have always been natural partners. So they are again in this delightful and penetrating attack on conventional thinking about property by Karen Coulter.
--Howard Zinn, Author of A People’s History of the United States, and Professor Emeritus at Boston University
 
In the very distant past, people had a limited sense of property. A man could own his spear, and a woman, her own digging stick.  Then came PROGRESS, and one could own land and a slave to work it.  Now as "progress" has taken over most parts of the world, we struggle from crisis to crisis.  Karen Coulter’s essay helps us find a way out of our predicament.
--Pete Seeger, Folk singer and Environmental Activist
 
Karen Coulter has written a delightfully accessible, thoroughly readable history of the enclosure of the commons and what we can (and must) do about it. In bringing this rich past alive, she leads the way to a world we know is possible.
--Maude Barlow, National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, winner of the 2005 Right Livelihood Award and author (with Tony Clarke) of "Blue Gold: The Fight to Stop Corporate Theft of the World’s Water"

 
Note to Editors: Publication date is March 4, 2007, but advance copies are now available.  Contact Judi Rizzi (1-800-316-2739) if you would like a copy for review. For all other inquiries, contact Ward Morehouse, Apex Press Publisher, ward@cipa-apex.org, 413-584-9642.
 
The Rule of Property by Karen Coulter. The Apex Press in cooperation with the Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy. 64pp. 2007. ISBN 1-891843-38-9 (softcover). U.S. $6.95. 1-800-316-2739; 914-271-6500; cipany@igc.org; www.cipa-apex.org