The urgent need for a large part of the world's population to access better medicines in more effective ways is one of the greatest concerns of the modern age. "Pillars for the Poorest" offers a new perspective on the controversial issue of the links between IP and access to medicine.

Using ethnographic case studies in Djibouti and Ghana, and an insight into active network theory, he explores ways in which TRIPs and pharmaceutical patents translate into the daily practices of those who buy, distribute, and use (or fail to) use drugs in sub-Saharan Africa. It suggests that focusing on routine practices and the physical dissemination of intellectual property greatly enriches our understanding of the complex dynamics that drive access to medicines and help to shift the role of law in those processes. It explains how IP affects access to medicines in ways that are often confidential, indirect and forgotten.

By exploring these complex mechanisms, he seeks to ask questions about the modalities of patent patent procedures, but also, more generally, about the complexity of legal things.