The Intellectual Property Conundrum: Individual Property Rights v. Cultural Development

Abstract

The premise behind modern intellectual property rights is to incentivize innovation. However, the modern intellectual property rights regime has three fundamental flaws that cut against its premise to kindle innovation. First, the modern regime conflicts with humans' innate learning and innovating process. Second, the modern regime restricts access to information, which stifles innovation evidenced by empirical studies. Third, the current formation of the social tradeoff is not effective, so it does not benefit society. In sum, the modern regime does not increase technological achievements, i.e. cultural development. These factors suggest alternative legal policies should be adopted, so governments can create laws that foster cultural development. Thus, if the end goal is truly to promote humanity’s wellbeing, then intellectual property rights must be reformed because they stifle innovation and criminalize creativity.