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Policy
Space for Development in the WTO and Beyond:
The Case of Intellectual Property Rights
By Ken Shadlen
Global governance in intellectual property
(IP) has changed dramatically in the last two decades,
and these changes have profound – and worrying
– implications for late development. What was
once principally an instrument of national policy is
now increasingly subject to international disciplines,
as the world moves ever-closer to harmonization in the
area of IP management. But moving toward harmonization
and achieving harmonization are different matters, and
it is essential to keep in mind that the former, not
the latter, describes contemporary arrangements: the
trend is toward a reduction in policy space, but the
outcome remains one where countries retain space for
autonomous IP management.
This paper examines the relationship between IP and
development, presenting a framework for assessing IP
regimes both cross-nationally and over time. It is then
shown how the trend toward harmonization places new
and significant restrictions on developing countries’
opportunities for policy innovation in IP management.
The implications of harmonization for a range of issues
are then considered, including late industrialization,
promotion of public health, and protection of biodiversity.
The paper shows that the new regulations are most accentuated
at the regional and bilateral level. Thus, for all of
the concerns that academics and policy analysts have
legitimately and rightly expressed over TRIPS, the biggest
threat to using IP policy as tool for realizing development
objectives comes not so much from the World Trade Organization
(WTO) as from bilateral and regional Preferential Trade
Agreements (PTAs) between developed and developing countries.
I demonstrate this by examining various aspects of IP
policy: over and over, we see that countries that are
parties to such PTAs have significantly less autonomy
in their management of IP. In the conclusion, a set
of policy recommendations are put forth, at both regional
and multilateral levels, for restoring countries’
ability to use IP as a tool for economic development.
The policy challenges are twofold: developing countries
must utilize and exploit the remaining opportunities
under TRIPS to use IP management for national development
purposes, and developing countries must be careful to
avoid bargaining away their remaining rights under PTAs.
“Policy Space for Development in the WTO and
Beyond: The Case of Intellectual Property Rights,”
is available online at: http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/Pubs/wp/05-06PolicySpace.pdf
For more on GDAE’s Globalization and Sustainable
Development Program:
http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/policy_research/globalization.html
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