IP Education - What next? A view from the Southern Cone

• Author: Maximiliano Marzetti
• Position: Professor of Intellectual Property (IP) Law & Economics at the Latin American School of Social Sciences
• Pages: 25-27

Thinking out of the box

In much of the world, IP education has focused

almost exclusively on IP law. Graduate programs in

IP are predominantly Master of Laws (LLM) courses

targeting lawyers, reflecting the word of the day:

“protection”. Placing primary emphasis on IP pro-

tection, however, has sparked much debate around

the world, fuelling diverging North-South perspec-

tives.2 A more holistic emphasis that encompasses

the business aspects of IP underlining the opportu-

nities it offers in terms of new jobs, wealth creation

and economic growth, promises a more construc-

tive and fruitful way forward. After all, IP rights are

tools to enable the entrepreneurship of ideas.

There is nothing inherently wrong with design-

ing a purely IP-focused curriculum centered on

the protection of valuable intangible assets which,

because of their economic nature (as non-rival

and non-excludable goods), require a legal shield

against free-riding to ensure there are incentives

to create and innovate. We need the protection

that IP rights afford in order for businesses to thrive.

But IP is about more than simply acquiring legal

monopolies; it is also about harnessing innovation

and creativity to create wealth. Successful, IP-based

companies make profits, create jobs, pay taxes and

fuel regional economic development. If we are

to exploit the commercial potential of IP and to

nurture a growing number of successful IP-based

companies, we need economics-literate lawyers

and IP-conscious managers.

In today’s knowledge economy, no business can

afford to go without an effective IP strategy. All

too often, companies in Latin America and be-

yond are unaware of how best to take advantage

of their IP, and fail to leverage their full market

potential. How, then, can this be turned around? IP

education is crucial. Just as lawyers need to be ex-

posed to business concepts, entrepreneurs need

to understand the benefits of IP. The time is ripe

to move away from primarily emphasizing IP law

and instead to incorporate a law and economics

dimension into IP education, focusing on the busi-

ness side of IP, particularly IP management, finance

and monetization.

Teaching lawyers in

Latin America

Argentina offers would-be IP lawyers a myriad of

undergraduate and graduate IP programs in a large

number of private and public universities through-

out the country. Buenos Aires, the nation’s capital,

boasts a number of high-quality educational in-

stitutions with excellent faculty members and has

a long and prestigious tradition in IP legal educa-

tion. The pioneering academic, Professor Pascual

Di Guglielmo, taught the first program on industrial

property rights (including copyright at a later stage)

at the School of Law and Social Sciences of the

University of Buenos Aires, from 1949 to 1955.

Today, a wide range of first-rate IP programs and le-

gal research activities are available to legal scholars

in Buenos Aires. These include:

two LLM programs in IP – one at the Latin

American School of Social Sciences (Facultad

Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales, FLACSO)

3

and the other at Austral University

4

– which

attract students from across Latin America;

a number of intensive graduate programs oered

by the University of Buenos Aires – one on copy-

right and related rights directed by Delia Lipszyc,

and one on industrial property rights directed by

Carlos Correa, both scholars of international

renown; and

IP Education – what next?

A VIEW FROM THE

SOUTHERN CONE

>>>

1 Facultad

Latinoamericana

de Ciencias Sociales

(FLACSO)

2 Ghafele, R., Perceptions

of Intellectual Property:

a review. 2008, IP

Institute: London

3 http://flacso.org.ar/

formacion_posgrados_

contenidos.php?ID=74

4 http://web.austral.

edu.ar/derecho-mpi-

caracteristicas.asp

25

Maximiliano Marzetti, Professor of Intellectual Property (IP) Law & Economics at

the Latin American School of Social Sciences,

1

a Pan-American research orga-

nization in Buenos Aires, discusses the need to rethink IP education curricula.

Traditionally, IP education has placed overriding emphasis on IP law. Professor

Marzetti underlines the need to adopt an economics-based approach to IP

legal education programs and, in parallel, to introduce specific IP business

management components to these programs. This, he contends, will enable

companies to fully leverage their IP assets for long-term economic growth and

development.

Photo: WIPO/Martha Chikowore