A Law and economics conference

April 4 – 6, 2003
Duke Law School
Durham, North Carolina

With the support of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Center for the Study of the Public Domain at Duke, the Center for the Public Domain, and the McGuire Center for International Studies at the University of Colorado.

International Public Goods and Transfer of Technology under a Globalized Intellectual Property Regime

Duke Law School : April 4 – 6, 2003

This major conference will focus the attention of leading economic and legal scholars on the bigger picture that is emerging from the upward harmonization of international intellectual property rights (IPRs) since the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) of 1994. Global IPRs are expected to increase innovation and trade in high technology goods, in addition to reducing costs of transferring proprietary information across borders. Despite these benefits, a “one size fits all” model raises fundamental concerns for the well-being of developing countries and, indeed, for small and medium-sized firms and researchers everywhere. Incentives to innovate must be balanced against the need for diffusion of new technologies, while measures to overcome market failure should not impoverish the public domain or unduly hinder healthy competition. Ever stronger and globally more comprehensive IPRs may turn out to impede the promotion of such public goods as sustainable development, widespread health care, technology transfer, and broad-based advances in science and education. They may also create barriers to entry and other anticompetitive effects.

The drive to harmonize IPR norms has been pushed forward in the name of expanding private rights with insufficient attention to the balance of public and private interests that traditionally underlies both intellectual property rights and the national systems of innovation they support. As the forward momentum of international trade negotiations heads toward an integrated global market, more light must be shed on the public processes and inputs that will be indispensable to any transnational system of innovation aiming to promote technical progress, economic growth and welfare for all participants. This is not merely a matter of vital interest to developing countries; it also affects the continuing ability of firms in developed countries to innovate in a more protective global environment.

This will be the first major conference to analyze the complex conceptual foundations of the new global IPR regime based on both legal and economic reasoning. It will examine ways and means to minimize social costs and enhance the benefits that could ensue from TRIPS and other international agreements by deliberately taking the promotion of public goods into account. An exceptional roster of distinguished economists, political scientists, legal scholars and others will address the following topics:

1. International Provision of Public Goods in the New Regime
2. Technology Transfer in the 21st Century
3. Reforming the Global IPR System to Promote Public Goods
4. Ensuring Access to Essential Medicines
5. Stimulating Local Innovation
6. The Critical Role of Competition Law in Preserving Public Goods
7. Preserving the Cultural and Scientific Commons
8. Recognition of Public Goods in WTO Dispute Settlement
9. Assessing the Suitability of IPRs for Traditional Knowledge and Cultural Industries

The conference is being organized by Keith Maskus, Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at the University of Colorado at Boulder and former lead research economist at the World Bank, and Jerome Reichman, the Bunyan S. Womble Professor of Law at Duke Law School.

Session 1: International Provision of Public Goods in the New Regime

Paul David, Professor of Economics, University of Oxford and Stanford University:
Koyaanisqatsi in Cyberspace: the Economics of an ‘Out-of-Balance’ Regime of Private Property Rights in Data and Information

Peter Drahos, Professor, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University:
The Regulation of Public Goods

Session 2: Technology Transfer in the 21^st Century

Carlos Correa, Professor and Director of the Masters Program on Science and Technology Policy and Management, University of Buenos Aires:
Can the TRIPS Agreement Foster Technology Transfer to Developing Countries?

Arti Rai, Assistant Professor, University of Pennsylvania School of Law:
Collective Action and Technology Transfer: The Case of “Low‑Value” Research

Keith Maskus, Professor and Chair, Department of Economics, University of Colorado at Boulder
and
Kamal Saggi, Associate Professor of Economics, Southern Methodist University:
Patent Rights and International Technology Transfer through Direct Investment and Licensing

Session 3: Reforming the Global IPR System to Promote Public Goods

John Barton, Professor, Stanford University School of Law:
A World Patent System

Pamela Samuelson, Professor, University of California at Berkeley School of Law
and
Suzanne Scotchmer, Professor of Economics and Public Policy, University of California at Berkeley:
Intellectual Property Arbitrage: How Foreign Rules Can Affect Domestic Protections

Timothy Swanson, Professor and Chair of Law and Economics, University College London:
Pests, Pathogens and Patent holders: Implications of Biotechnologies for Patent Policies

Session 4: Ensuring Access to Essential Medicines

Frederick Abbott, Edward Ball Eminent Scholar, Professor of International Law, Florida State University College of Law:
Managing the Hydra: Resolving Roadblocks to Ensuring Access to Essential Medicines

Henry Grabowski, Professor of Economics, Duke University:
Patents, Innovation and Access to New Pharmaceuticals

Rebecca Eisenberg, Robert and Barbara Luciano Professor of Law, University of Michigan School of Law:
Access to Essential Medicines: Is Law the Problem? Is Law the Solution?

Session 5: Stimulating Local Innovation

Ashish Arora, Associate Professor of Economics and Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon University:
Trading Technology: IPR and the Market for Technology and R&D Services

Michael Blakeney, Herchel Smith Professor of Intellectual Property Law and Director, Queen Mary Intellectual Property Research Institute, University of London:
Stimulating Agricultural Innovation

Tracy Lewis, Professor of Economics, Fuqua School of Business, Duke University
and
Chair: Jerome Reichman, Bunyan S. Womble Professor of Law, Duke Law School:
Economics and Law of Liability Rules and Small—Scale Innovation

Session 6: The Critical Role of Competition Law in Preserving Public Goods

Eleanor Fox, Walter J. Derenberg Professor of Trade Regulation, New York University School of Law:
Can Antitrust Protect the Global Commons from the Excesses of IPRs?

Mark D. Janis, Professor, H. Blair & Joan V. White Intellectual Property Law Scholar, University of Iowa College of Law:
“Minimal” Standards for Patent/Antitrust Under TRIPS

Hanns Ullrich, Professor, Institut fur vergleichendes Wirtschaftsrecht, Fakultat fur Wirtschafts— und Organisationswissenschaften, Universitat der Bundeswehr Munchen:
Expansionist intellectual property protection and reductionist competition rules: A TRIPS Perspective

Session 7: Preserving the Cultural and Scientific Commons

Robert Evenson, Professor of Economics, Yale University:
Agricultural Research and Intellectual Property Rights

Richard Nelson, Professor of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University:
The Market Economy, and the Scientific Commons

Ruth Okediji, William L. Prosser Professor of Law, University of Minnesota College of Law:
Sustainable Access to Information Works in the Digital Age

Paul Uhlir, Director of International Scientific and Technical Information Programs, the National Academies:
Preserving Access to Public Data Resources for Science and Development

Session 8: Recognition of Public Goods in WTO Dispute Settlement

Joost Pauwelyn, Associate Professor, Duke Law School:
The Nature of WTO Dispute Settlement

Eric Bond, Professor of Economics, Pennsylvania State University:
Economics of Dispute Resolution with IPRs

Rochelle Cooper Dreyfuss, Pauline Newman Professor of Law, New York University School of Law
and
Graeme Dinwoodie, Professor of Law & Norman and Edna Freehling Scholar, Director of the Program in Intellectual Property Law, Chicago—Kent College of Law:
WTO Dispute Resolution and the Preservation of the Public Domain of Science under International Law

Session 9: Assessing the Suitability of IPRs for Traditional Knowledge and Cultural Industries

Thomas Cottier, Professor, the Institute of European and International Economic Law, Universität Bern, Switzerland:
Legal Perspectives on Traditional Knowledge

Graham Dutfield, Herchel Smith Senior Research Fellow, Queen Mary Intellectual Property Research Institute, University of London:
Legal and Economic Aspects of Traditional Knowledge

Antony Taubman, Acting Director, Traditional Knowledge Division, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Senior Lecturer, Australian National University:
Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore – An International Perspective

Session 10: Overview Commentary on Balancing Public and Private Interests

Chairs: Jerome Reichman and Keith Maskus

David Vaver, Reuters Professor of Intellectual Property & IT Law, University of Oxford

Martin J. Adelman, Professor and Director of the Intellectual Property Law Program, George Washington University Law School

Peter Gerhart, Professor, Case Western Reserve University School of Law

Hugh Hansen, Professor, Fordham University School of Law

Geoff Tansey, TRIPS Programme Consultant, Quaker United Nations Office

Gustavo Ghidini, Professor of Intellectual Property, Faculty of Law, Luiss University, Rome, Italy