Framing Intellectual Property Law in the 21st Century

Rochelle Cooper Dreyfuss

"It is certainly enriching to welcome new participants into the debate over the proper scope of intellectual property rights and the appropriate balance between the proprietary interests of right holders and the access interests of the public. However, the discussion has become fragmented and heated. Important issues remain unresolved. In our experience, the problem appears, at least in part, to be that those participating in the debate begin with different premises. As a result, they frame the questions involved in balancing interests quite differently. At one end of the spectrum are observers who see intellectual property through a frame of incentives, who believe that strong exclusive rights are necessary to prevent free riders from competing down the price of innovations and undermining the returns available from taking the risks entailed in creative production. Without strong...