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- The rise of the knowledge economy and the
increasing importance of information-based business in the world
economy has been accompanied by a growing interest in the role
of Intellectual Property Rights, both in securing the returns
to investments in these businesses and in guaranteeing the diffusion
of new ideas and knowledge. The central concern of this proposal
is the various challenges and policy issues that are raised by
the evolution of the IP institutions in the context of the new
knowledge-based economy, an area of great policy concern for
the future of European economic competitiveness and social cohesion.
The participants, based in six European teams, propose the organisation
of five seminars and a final conference on various IPR issues
that will facilitate the creation of a network bringing together
economists, lawyers, sociologists, political scientists and policy
makers in order to address these issues and discuss their implications
at the European level.
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- The first four seminars will deal with
the changing nature of the system, mechanisms to solve the problems
posed by the patent thicket, the level of diversity the system
should reach with reference to the variety of situations and
contexts, and the potential clash between some aggressive patent
strategies and the economy of knowledge production and access
in certain fields like healthcare and education. The fifth seminar
will address more directly the issue of European policy. Based
on the discussions of the previous seminars, this last seminar
will examine carefully the policy implications for the EU IPR
regime.
Then a final conference will be designed as initial event of
the future network of excellence in order to create a research
programme on the basis of the results of the 5 seminars.
- Each event will be interdisciplinary (assembling
economists, political scientists, sociologists and lawyers) and
will be organised as to ensure strong interactions between academic
researchers and policy makers and practitioners.
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