* [Reproduced from the text provided by the World Intellectual Property Organization.
[The parties to the Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization are found at 33 I.L.M. 1132 [1994]; the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, April 15, 1994, appears at 33 I.L.M. 1197 [1994]; the Convention Establishing the World Intellectual Property Organization, July 14, 1967, appears at 6 I.L.M. 782 [1967]; and the Stockholm Revision of the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, July 14, 1967, appears at 6 I.L.M. 806 [1967].
[For additional information contact the World Intellectual Property Organization, 34, Chemin des Colombettes, CH-1211 Geneva 20, Switzerland [tel.: [41X22]730 9046; fax: [41][22]733 5428].]
The World Trade Organization's [WTO] Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights [TRIPS Agreement] has been the focus of intense scholarly debate regarding the effects of IP protection on the development interests of the global South. Far less attention has been directed at the organizational framework in which future IP norms should be developed. The governing assumption has been that the norm-setting role of the World Intellectual Property Organization [WIPO] remains unchanged notwithstanding the primacy of the WTO as an Organization with explicit mandate for global IP regulation.
In this Article, I argue that the WTO, in a hierarchical division of labor with WIPO, should be promoted as the locus of IP norm-setting, particularly with respect to those norms that affect the regulation and supply of global public goods. IP norm-setting in the WTO is not without risks. Nonetheless, an organizational culture in which IP protection is one of many tools to accomplish defined welfare goals, rather than the raison d'être of the organization's existence, may force open important institutional space in which future IP norms consistent both with the interests of less developed countries and the ideals of mature IP systems, can be meaningfully negotiated. At a minimum, a hierarchical relationship could facilitate inter-institutional competition between the WTO and WIPO, generating additional welfare gains for the international community in the form of greater transparency in the processes of IP norm-setting, improvements in the democratic deficit inherent in international organizations generally, as well as systemic gains from enhanced accountability in the global management of IP.
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The current, prevailing narrative on the WIPO-WTO relationship refers to “forum-shifting”. The idea is that developed countries moved from WIPO to WTO in order to obtain stronger IP protection at the international level by joining trade talks with IP negotiations. As a result, WTO would have become the main international forum for trade-related IP issues. This paper argues that the forum-shifting narrative, despite
its merits, may fail to catch the complexity of WIPO-WTO relationship. Moreover, long-standing issues, as well as recent developments in trade and IP, demonstrate that the two Organizations have been characterized by continuity and constitute in reality interdependent, complementary fora. This is not to deny the differences existing between WIPO and WTO nor to discard the merits of the forum-shifting theory. Nonetheless, it is argued, it is time to move beyond it in order to grasp the
implications of the WIPO-WTO relationship towards future international economic governance.Abstract
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- Abstract
- Metadata
The current, prevailing narrative on the WIPO-WTO relationship refers to “forum-shifting”. The idea is that developed countries moved from WIPO to WTO in order to obtain
stronger IP protection at the international level by joining trade talks with IP negotiations. As a result, WTO would have become the main international forum for trade-related IP issues. This paper argues that the forum-shifting narrative, despite its merits, may fail to catch the complexity of WIPO-WTO relationship. Moreover, long-standing issues, as well as recent developments in trade and IP, demonstrate that the two Organizations have been characterized by continuity and constitute in
reality interdependent, complementary fora. This is not to deny the differences existing between WIPO and WTO nor to discard the merits of the forum-shifting theory. Nonetheless, it is argued, it is time to move beyond it in order to grasp the implications of the WIPO-WTO relationship towards future international economic governance.Abstract
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| 715 | 541 | 30 |
| 32 | 22 | 0 |
| 111 | 81 | 2 |