ABSTRACT
This paper encourages intellectual property owners, especially corporate owners, to make decisions and implement socially valuable and positively impactful strategies for their intellectual property rights. This paper argues that if corporate and business owners of intellectual property understand the role that their intellectual property rights can have in creating a positive social impact, the influence that they can have in the market as a result, and what that means for their business. They would pay more attention to how their use of intellectual property impacts society and the planet.
This essay unfolds in 3 parts. Part I is normative and argues that companies and businesses should care about the impact their decisions and business practices around intellectual property have on society because their purpose as a business extends beyond shareholder wealth maximization. Businesses also need to care about the impact they have on society and the planet. Part II is prescriptive and discusses how the legal system can create the right conditions that make it economically efficient for businesses and companies to decide to do good through the use of their intellectual property rights and create an impact that benefits their communities and stakeholders. This paper argues that the law should create conditions that enable and empower companies to use their intellectual property positively above incentivizing or punishing specific behaviors. Part III lays out the practical steps legal systems can take to allow companies and businesses to make socially valuable business decisions in how intellectual property rights are used and implement them more easily. This paper concludes with the idea that socially valuable intellectual property directly impacts patents and copyright’s constitutional purpose of promoting progress.
Ng, Alina, The Social Value of Intellectual Property (September 18, 2022), IP Theory, volume 12, issue 3, article 1 (2023).
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