This study engages in an ethical examination of contemporary socio-ecological and economic issues which takes seriously the plight of Africa, African communities, indigenous knowledge and biodiversity. It studies the impact of bioprospecting, biopiracy and intellectual property rights regimes on the protection, use, access to, and conservation of biodiversity and indigenous knowledge in Africa. The study also examines the ways in which northern multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies and their agents prospect and convert African resources (biological commons and indigenous knowledge) into their intellectual property as well as private property. It argues that the transfer of African biological commons and indigenous knowledge is exacerbated by economic globalisation and the neo-colonial mentality of conquest concealed under the guise of commerce. The study demonstrates through concrete case studies the tactics used by northern multinational corporations to claim these resources as their intellectual property rights and private property. It observes that the privatisation of biological commons and indigenous knowledge only brings about nominal or no benefits to African communities who have nurtured and continue to nurture them. It also observes that this privatisation results in fewer benefits for biodiversity as they lead to the promotion of monoculture, i.e. commercialisation of all things. To address the injustice and exploitative implications of bioprospecting, biopiracy and intellectual property rights, the study recommends the adoption and implementation of the African model law, the establishment of defensive intellectual property rights mechanisms, and the strategy of resistance and advocacy. It suggests that these measures ought to be grounded on the African normative principle of botho and the Christian ethical principle of justice. / Systematic Theology and Theological Ethics / D.Th.(Theological Ethics)

A patent is an intellectual property right granted as a reward for the labours of the inventor so as to commercially exploit the invention in return for disclosure of the invention. The benefits of the patent system find perfect expression in the employment situation since the employer is better equipped to exploit the invention through provision of resources and capital whereas the employee is provided with an opportunity to develop his technical know-how. A comparative study of the laws pertaining to employee inventions in the United Kingdom, Federal Republic of Germany and the United States of America reveals a variety of approaches to the subject of employee inventions. The approach of the South African law on the subject is inadequate and legal reform is a necessity. The recommendations for such reform encapsulates a blend of the best features of each of the three national approaches to employee inventions. / Mercentile Law / LL. M. (Law)

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

L'article 42 de la Convention de Vienne impose au vendeur de livrer la marchandise libre de tout droit ou prétention de tiers fondé sur la propriété intellectuelle. Ses conditions d'entrée en jeu requièrent l'analyse de ce que chaque contractant connaissait ou ne pouvait ignorer au sujet de la propriété intellectuelle du tiers. Ce passage de la Convention connaît des interprétations variées. Afin de contribuer à une interprétation uniforme et plus prévisible de l'article, le projet s'attache à le replacer sur la trame plus générale du commerce international, où le droit de la propriété intellectuelle pose des obstacles aux mouvements transfrontaliers des marchandises. Il est d'abord comparé avec la théorie de l'épuisement des droits, puis mis en parallèle avec les moyens qui sont accessibles aux opérateurs commerciaux pour prévenir le problème d'interférence avec les droits intellectuels. À la lumière des modes limités de publicité des droits intellectuels et de la complexité des régimes conçus pour protéger les créations, il apparaît que ce domaine ne permet pas de prévenir efficacement les risques pouvant contrecarrer la vente. La solution proposée par la Convention de Vienne est enfin confrontée aux principes généraux dont elle s'inspire. Ceux-ci disposent de présomptions d'égalité et de compétence à l'égard des opérateurs. Elles ne peuvent être repoussées que par une démonstration de déséquilibre substantiel, ce qui provoque l'intensification des obligations d'information et de coopération sur les épaules du contractant qualifié au service de l'autre. Il ressort de la démarche que l'équilibre contractuel qui sous-tend l'article 42 se fonde sur une répartition particulière de la prévention. La spécificité des droits intellectuels le requiert. / Article 42 of the Vienna Sales Convention requires that the seller delivers goods which are free from any right or claim of a third party based on intellectual property. Its trigger mechanism, however, requires the analysis of what each party knew of said intellectual property or what they each could not have been unaware of. This passage has been the object of various interpretations. With the intention to contribute to a more uniform and predictable interpretation of article 42, the project seeks to replace the provision in the general context of international trade, where intellectual property law sets obstacles to cross-border movement of goods. Article 42 is first compared with the theory of exhaustion of rights and placed in parallel with the resources available to prevent the problem of interference with intellectual property rights. In light of the limited modes of publicity of intellectual rights and the complexity of the protections they involve, it appears that intellectual property law does not allow effective means of prevention.The solution proposed by the Vienna Convention is finally confronted with the general principles on which it is based. Those principles set forth presumptions of professional quality and equality between parties, which cannot be refuted unless a substantial imbalance can be established. In such cases, the balance can be restored by increased disclosure and cooperation obligations on the shoulders of the qualified party. The project concludes that article 42 is based on a particular distribution of expectations pertaining to the prevention of intellectual property problems. The specificity of intellectual property rights requires such stability.

1 Thesis Summary Private Enforcement of EU Competition Law Zuzana Šimeková 1. Starting points and goals of the thesis The main goal of my thesis is the application of the ever-evolving contemporary issues of private enforcement of the EU competition law, its developments in the legislative area and the decision- making practice of the European Commission and the Court of Justice of the European Union (the ECJ) to the pharmaceutical sector area. As regards the functioning of competition rules, the pharmaceutical sector found itself in the cross-hairs of the European Commission fairly recently. Its efforts resulted in the Pharmaceutical Sector Inquiry Final Report of 8 July 2009 (the Final Report). The primary subject-matter of my thesis is the assessment of the competition relationship dynamic between the originator and generic pharmaceutical companies, especially the degree by which the conduct by the originator pharmaceutical companies can delay market entry by the generic pharmaceutical companies and thereby negatively affect the consumers by (among other things) limiting availability of cheaper drugs. Despite the expectations of legal practitioners and academia, the European Commission did not rule in the Final Report whether the discovered conducts constitute violations of the EU competition law. The...

Diese Dissertation behandelt Fragen des Wettbewerbs auf Softwaremärkten. Konkret geht es um folgende Frage: Welchen Einfluss haben kleine und mittelständische Unternehmen (KMUs) auf die Wettbewerbskonditionen in der Softwarebranche vor dem Hintergrund des zunehmenden Einsatzes von rechtlichen Maßnahmen zum Schutze des geistigen Eigentums? Theoretischer Teil: Wir untersuchen theoretisch Übertragungseffekte (Spillovers) zwischen KMUs und größeren Softwareunternehmen im Kontext von gebündelten Produkten (bundling). Während Bundling und die resultierenden wettbewerbspolitischen Optionen in einem statischen Kontext gut verstanden sind, gibt es noch offene Fragen im dynamischen Kontext. Hier untersuchen wir, inwieweit die Standardargumente gegen Bundling an Gültigkeit verlieren. Wir kommen zum Schluss, dass Wettbewerbspolitik in Softwaremärkten in einem dynamischen Kontext Bundling durchaus in Betracht ziehen sollte. Empirischer Teil: Wir untersuchen, ob der zunehmende Einsatz von Schutzrechten durch KMUs dazu führt, dass der Wettbewerb im Bereich der Informations- und Kommunikationstechnologien (IuK) zunimmt. Diese empirisch fundierte Arbeit analysiert einen Datensatz von KMUs aus der IuK-Industrie unter besonderer Berücksichtigung von Softwareherstellern. Mit Hilfe einer Varianzanalyse untersuchen wir den Einfluss von vier Faktoren auf den Einsatz von Schutzrechten, nämlich: Globalisierung, rechtliches Umfeld, kooperative Forschung und Open Source Software-Nutzung. / This dissertation focuses on competition within the software market. Specifically it aims to provide further understanding and insights to the following question: In the context of intellectual property rights (IPR), what impact do small and medium sized enterprises (SME) have on competition in the software industry? Normative contribution to the dynamic policy literature: Bundling and the resulting competition policy measures are well understood under static conditions. In this essay, we theoretically examine the spillover exchange between SME and large software firms in the context of bundling. Based on the findings of our static model, we suggest that competition policy in the software market should consider bundling under dynamic competition because it could lead to a different conclusion resulting from the factors unique to the software market e.g., OSS programmers. Positive contribution to IPR literature: We empirically examine whether increased IPR adoption by small and medium sized enterprises enables greater competition within the information and communications sector. The analysis is based on a dataset of SME in the information and communications sector which also includes the software industry. We make use of the analysis of variance in order to study the impact of four factors on SME adoption of intellectual property rights, namely; globalization, legal frameworks, cooperative research and open source software use and development. i

Face aux limites d’un modèle social fondé sur la propriété absolue, l’usufruit, défini comme un droit de jouissance temporaire sur la chose d’autrui, apparaît aujourd’hui comme un outil fondamentalement utile. C’est aussi un droit en pleine expansion, comme en témoigne la diversification croissante de ses applications. Le quasi-usufruit, l’usufruit successif, l’usufruit temporaire, conditionnel, éventuel mais aussi l’usufruit des créances, des droits sociaux, des droits de propriété intellectuelle ou des universalités de fait sont autant d’exemples d’un usufruit que l’on peut dire « atypique » en raison de ses particularismes de régime. Ce sont ces mécanismes que la présente étude se propose d’étudier. Plus précisément, il s’agit de déterminer si les usufruits spéciaux peuvent ou non se concilier avec le modèle classique de l’usufruit, autrement dit, si une définition et un régime communs demeurent possibles. La démarche suppose alors de trancher la controverse toujours vive de la définition de l’usufruit en un démembrement de la propriété, et, ce faisant, d’apporter des solutions aux insuffisances bien connues des règles classiques de l’usufruit, telles que l’absence de relations personnelles entre les parties, et de manière générale, leur séparation trop stricte dans l’exercice de l’usufruit. De ce point de vue, la réflexion sur les usufruits atypiques crée l’occasion de repenser l’institution entière, et apparaît comme la source d’un potentiel renouvellement. / In the face of the limits of a social model organization based on absolute property rights, the right of usufruct (usufruit), which can be defined as a temporary right of use on another individual’s property, appears nowadays as fundamental tool. Usufruct is also a thriving tool, as evidenced by the growing diversification of its implementations. In this regard, the rise of atypical forms of usufruct – usufruct rights that differ substantially from the traditional form and regime of usufruct – is particularly striking. Quasi-usufruct (also known as irregular usufruct), successive usufruct, temporary, conditional or potential usufruct, as well as usufruct on debts, shares, and intellectual property rights are just examples of this booming phenomenon. They are the subject of this research. More precisely, this research seeks to determine whether such atypical rights of usufruct may be accommodated to the more traditional form of usufruct. In other word, the question is whether a characterization and legal regime common to both traditional and atypical forms of usufruct can be achieved. Therefore, this study aims at resolving past debates over the characterization of usufruct as a breaking-up of property rights and at providing remedies to the well-known insufficiencies in the traditional legal framework of usufruct rights, such as the absence of interpersonal relations between the parties, and more generally, their strict dissociation in the actual exercise of the usufruct right. In this perspective, this research on the atypical forms of usufruct is the occasion to fully rethink this legal institution, and opens the way for its prospective renewal.

Submitted by Filipe dos Santos (fsantos@pucsp.br) on 2018-03-26T12:28:30Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Alyne Viana de Oliveira.pdf: 1727106 bytes, checksum: 3089f02be85c7d292d871f3440c180e3 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-03-26T12:28:30Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Alyne Viana de Oliveira.pdf: 1727106 bytes, checksum: 3089f02be85c7d292d871f3440c180e3 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-02-28 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / The present work aims to analyze the participation of interest groups in the definition of the American foreign policy when defending their interests. Based on the two-level model proposed by Robert Putnam, it considers the impact of domestic actors in the decision-making process of the US foreign trade policy. From this perspective, we analyze how the pharmaceutical industry lobby is organized and its strategies to assert their interests and influence the formulation of the country's foreign policy, by using its financial resources and channels of influence with governamental institutions responsible for the definition of trade policy to pressure the US government in its international negotiations for regulations that would benefit the sector. Thus, the case study of the TRIPS Agreement (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) negotiations under GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) demonstrates how the pharmaceutical lobby strategy proved to be efficient / A presente pesquisa tem como objetivo analisar a participação de grupos de interesse na definição da política externa norte-americana ao defenderem seus interesses econômicos. Com base no modelo do jogo de dois níveis proposto por Robert Putnam, considera-se o impacto dos atores domésticos no processo de tomada de decisão na política externa comercial dos Estados Unidos. Sob tal perspectiva, analisaremos como lobby da indústria farmacêutica norte-americana se organizou e quais estratégias foram adotadas por eles para fazer valer os seus interesses e influenciar a formulação da política externa do país, utilizando seus recursos financeiros e influência política junto a instituições governamentais responsáveis pela definição da política comercial para pressionar o governo norte-americano em suas negociações internacionais por regulamentações que beneficiassem o setor. Assim, o estudo de caso das negociações do acordo TRIPS (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) no âmbito do GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) demonstra como a estratégia do lobby farmacêutico se revelou eficiente

<p>Debate over Intellectual Property Rights ‘IPRs’ particularly patent and copyrights is mainly on forward-looking industries in computer software. As part of a trade deal reached in 1994, the member nations of the World Trade Organisation must adhere to a global agreement known as TRIPS, for the Trade- Related Aspect of Intellectual Property Rights.</p><p>This study is to analyse the ethical conception of Intellectual Property Rights and in particular its implications on the developing countries in relation to TRIPS. The approach will be to analyse a broad philosophical theories of property to see if there is any justification for a software program to be treated as private property and also argue base on John Rawls two principles of justice in relation to TRIPS Agreement. Some reflections will be put on the use of open-source software by less developing countries.</p><p>From the study it was asserted that, strong IPRs protection would hinder technological transfer and indigenous learning activities in the early stage of industrialisation when learning takes place through reverse engineering. And policy makers should consider differentiation in terms of the level of economic and industrial development, if protection and enforcement of IPRs is intended to enhance technological development.</p>

Debate over Intellectual Property Rights ‘IPRs’ particularly patent and copyrights is mainly on forward-looking industries in computer software. As part of a trade deal reached in 1994, the member nations of the World Trade Organisation must adhere to a global agreement known as TRIPS, for the Trade- Related Aspect of Intellectual Property Rights. This study is to analyse the ethical conception of Intellectual Property Rights and in particular its implications on the developing countries in relation to TRIPS. The approach will be to analyse a broad philosophical theories of property to see if there is any justification for a software program to be treated as private property and also argue base on John Rawls two principles of justice in relation to TRIPS Agreement. Some reflections will be put on the use of open-source software by less developing countries. From the study it was asserted that, strong IPRs protection would hinder technological transfer and indigenous learning activities in the early stage of industrialisation when learning takes place through reverse engineering. And policy makers should consider differentiation in terms of the level of economic and industrial development, if protection and enforcement of IPRs is intended to enhance technological development.