Legislative consolidation of copyright on Ukrainian lands within the austrian (Austro-Hungarian) empire

Abstract

The article analyzes the genesis of the normative consolidation of copyright law in the Ukrainian lands of the Austrian (Austro-Hungarian) empire. The thesis is substantiated that the formation of copyright law, as a legal institution in the western Ukrainian lands, followed a peculiar way. It has been formed under the influence of the main European concepts of the legal protection of copyright law and the legislative norms of the Austrian state. It has been established that the preconditions for the origins of copyright law in Europe were the origin of printing, the commercialization of publishing, and the professionalization of literary activity. It has been discovered that the legislation of copyright law in the Austrian state was formed much later than in the leading European countries. Primarily, there has existed as part of censorship legislation. Only in the middle of the 19th century, separate copyright law has been adopted. It has been detected that the right of literary property arose first, and later the same legal principles were used to protect the works of composers and artists. The thesis is proved the spread of the proprietary concept of copyright in Austrian law. It has been suggested that until the beginning of the 20th century, copyright law has been already understood as the exclusive right of the author to publish, reproduce, distribute and translate the work. However, Austrian legislation did not distinguish the personal non-property rights of authors.
 It has been stated that all general approaches to the legislative consolidation of copyright law in the Austrian state were also extended under control to Ukrainian lands. It has been suggested that Austria, compared to other states that enslaved Ukrainian lands, created the most favorable conditions for the preservation of Ukrainian identity: Ukrainian-language books were published, the equality of languages was proclaimed, and official collections of state regulations were translated into Ukrainian. Finally, it allowed Ukrainians to realize the necessity for legal protection of intellectual property rights.