Intellectual Property Rights: A Utilitarian Perspective

Abstract

Intellectual property is characterized as a set of intangible assets which is a product of human intellect and needs to be protected by having similar protective rights that apply to physical/tangible assets. Considering the utilitarian perspective upon this, it can be said that Jeremy Bentham being the founder of utilitarian theory, he had opined with regards to intellectual property that the authors, inventors and the artists should enjoy exclusive rights to their writings and discoveries for a limited period of time and be provided with absolute privilege over their work and to ensure that they get properly remunerated for the same.

The utilitarian institution proposes that the creators of intellectual property must be given adequate incentive and so it is also known as the incentive theory. Bentham opined that trade barriers to foreign imports restrict the increase of trade and commerce of a nation. He applied this concept with the intellectual property rights and believed that the creator must be given absolute privilege in order to recover the amount invested during the inventive process. The monopoly stems are defended and encouraged by the utilitarian theory but only for a limited period of time and a balance should strike between monopoly rights of the creators and giving access of the inventions to the population by the legislators.

Therefore, the present research explores the utilitarian theory and its interplay with the intellectual property rights.

Keywords: IPR, utilitarianism, inventors, monopoly, rights