A paradigmatic reading of intellectual property protection

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to verify if, and to what extent, the directives that guide the paradigms of modernity and postmodernity can be identified in the economic/proprietary, constitutional and competition-based approaches to the protection of intellectual property. It applies the deductive method of approach, the monographic procedure and the bibliographic research technique. The discussion examines the role of property in the formation of the modern and postmodern legal and political paradigm, analyses the protection of intellectual property under the three approaches indicated and proposes a paradigmatic reading of them. It addresses the role of strictly economic analysis in defining intellectual property and technological development policies and the way constitutional and competition limitations balance it, as well as the characterisation of intellectual property as a special constitutional property and the treatment of its social function as an interface with the subjective right of the community. There is progress in the complementarity of the approaches presented, but there are also limits on their reach as a special constitutional property.