Are intellectual property rights compatible with Rawlsian principles of justice?

This paper argues that intellectual property rights are incompatible with Rawls’s principles of justice. This conclusion is based upon an analysis of the social stratification that emerges as a result of the patent mechanism which defines a marginalized group and ensure that its members remain alien...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ethics and information technology 2012-06, Vol.14 (2), p.109-121
Main Author: Murphy, Darryl J.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Compatibility
Computer Science
Copyright
Copyrights
Ethics
Exact sciences and technology
Information and communication sciences
Information science. Documentation
Information systems
Innovation/Technology Management
Intellectual property
Justice
Legal aspects : intellectual property, producer responsability
Legal aspects : intellectual property, producer responsability. Ethics
Legislation
Library and information science. General aspects
Library Science
Management of Computing and Information Systems
Ontology
Original Paper
Piracy
Property rights
Sciences and techniques of general use
Social justice
Stratification
Studies
Trademarks
User Interfaces and Human Computer Interaction
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Summary:This paper argues that intellectual property rights are incompatible with Rawls’s principles of justice. This conclusion is based upon an analysis of the social stratification that emerges as a result of the patent mechanism which defines a marginalized group and ensure that its members remain alienated from the rights, benefits, and freedoms afforded by the patent product. This stratification is further complicated, so I argue, by the copyright mechanism that restricts and redistributes those rights already distributed by means of the patent mechanism. I argue that the positions of privilege established through both the patent and the copyright mechanisms are positions that do not “allow the most extensive liberty compatible with a like liberty for all.” They do not “benefit the least advantaged.” Nor are they “open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity.” In making this argument I critically assess the utilitarian defense of intellectual property rights and find it insufficient to respond to the injustices manifest in our current arrangement for the protection of intellectual property rights.
ISSN:1388-1957
1572-8439
DOI:10.1007/s10676-012-9288-8