The Human Rights Implications of Intellectual Property Protection

[PILCH Hartmut <phm@a2e.de>]

see

http://www3.oup.co.uk/jielaw/hdb/Volume_05/Issue_04/050861.sgm.abs.html  ;

Journal of International Economic Law  

Volume 5, Issue 4, December 2002: pp. 861-882  

The Human Rights Implications of Intellectual Property Protection  

Audrey R. Chapman1  

  A variety of human rights organizations and agencies have begun to 
  realize that the manner in which creative works, cultural heritage, 
  and scientific knowledge are turned into property has implications 
  for human rights .... 

I wonder how many of these organisations have already realised that
patents curtail individual liberties in a very drastic manner which
is unknown from copyright or other more legitimate forms of what
people call "intellectual property". 

When will human rights organisations start to realise that the US is
the world wide leader of human rights violations in this area?

When will human rights activists realise that the freedom of publication,
as guaranteed by Art 10 of the European Convention on the Protection of
Human Rights (ECPHR) has been grossly neglected by the European Commission
and even more by the Council of the European Union?

By demanding program claims, the latter are proposing to entrench
patents as a limit on the freedom of publication, although the exclusion
right conferred by a patent can in no case have a status of legitimacy
that is anywhere near that of a third person's human and civil rights,
which, according to Art 10 ECPHR are the only legitimate conditions
for limiting the freedom of publication.

The CEC and CEU have so far not even mentioned the freedom of
publication in their proposals.  Nor has anyone in the US.  The US is
currently putting intense pressure on the whole world to
introduce/eternalise unlimited patentability according to the US
model.  The US demands concerning SPLT are a direct assault on human
rights.

I hope that human rights organisations can finally discover this problem.
We are here not dealing with just another attempt to extend the scope of
the meaning of "human rights" for political purposes, but with fending off
an assault to the heart of the concept of human rights, which is taking
place under our eyes, because we wrongly believe that our countries have
an independent judiciary which will effectively defend our basic rights
in all fields.

-- 
Hartmut Pilch, FFII & Eurolinux Alliance              tel. +49-89-12789608   
Protecting Innovation against Patent Inflation       http://swpat.ffii.org/
130,000 signatures against software patents      http://www.noepatents.org/