The Handbook of Global Science, Technology, and Innovation

Chapter 20The Globalization of Intellectual Property Rights

Andrea Filippetti and Daniele Archibugi

Introduction¹

The international economic landscape is periodically rattled by controversies concerning intellectual property rights (IPRs). To secure market shares, companies introduce new products and processes and this often leads to controversies for the real or supposed violations of patents, copyrights, and trademarks. Very often, the companies involved in these battles are based in different countries. The so-called smart phones war (Filippetti 2012; Graham and Vishnubhakat 2013; Wikipedia 2014) has recently captured the attention of public opinion because the product at stake is in the hands of top managers and leading politicians as well as in those of teenagers.

On some occasions, companies complain because supposedly some governments do not adequately protect their intellectual property, the most dramatic example being the coalition of large multinationals in the pharmaceutical industry, the so-called “big pharma,” against the South African government for infringement of their IPRs on anti-HIV drugs (Fisher and Rigamonti 2005). In other occasions, the controversies do not directly involve competing companies, but rather the national governments themselves. This is, for example, the case with current controversies debated at the World Trade Organization (WTO) under the Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement.

These controversies reflect ...