Intellectual Property Rights In Developing Nations

Sourav Chatterjee, Jesse David, Fei Deng, Christian Dippon and Mario Lopez

Intellectual property rights (IPR) are legal entitlements granted by governments within their respective sovereignties that provide patent, trademark, and copyright owners the exclusive right to exploit their intellectual property (IP) for a certain period. The basic rationale for IPR protection is to provide an incentive for innovation by granting IP owners an opportunity to recover their costs of research and development.

While many countries have some form of IPR protection, the degree to which IPR is protected varies greatly. For economists, IPR protection represents a tradeoff between the benefits of innovation and the costs of exclusivity. Property rights encourage the development of new technologies, products, music, and other creative output. Exclusivity, however, protects IP owners from competition and, in some cases, can grant monopoly power. For this reason, IPR protection is