Resolving the patents paradox in the era of COVID-19 and climate change: Towards a patents taxonomy

dc.contributor.authorBustamante, Juanaen
dc.contributor.authorOughton, Christineen
dc.contributor.authorPesque-Cela, Vanesaen
dc.contributor.authorTobin, Damianen
dc.date.accessioned2023-07-14T11:20:03Z
dc.date.available2023-07-14T11:20:03Z
dc.date.issued2023-07-13en
dc.description.abstractThis paper revisits the patents debate and considers the role of intellectual property rights and their impact on society in the context of inventions designed to protect global common pool resources (CPRs) such as public health and the environment. A review of the theoretical and empirical literature suggests that there has never been a clear consensus among researchers on the benefits of the patent system and intellectual property rights. As Robinson notes, “The patent system introduces some of the greatest of the complexities in the capitalist rules of the game and leads to many anomalies.” We explore these anomalies by specifying a taxonomy of patents for different classes of inventions, including inventions to protect CPRs. This includes vaccines and inventions that reduce externalities, such as, CFC gases and greenhouse gas emissions. In these instances, the effectiveness of innovations depends critically on rapid global diffusion. Our theoretical analysis utilises Ostrom's CPR dilemma to analyse the complexities surrounding innovation and CPRs. We find that the effectiveness of innovations to protect CPRs depends on industrial characteristics and the wider regulatory environment. Empirical evidence is brought to bear on these conclusions via 2 case studies that each embodies a natural experiment; one on vaccines pre- and post-TRIPS and one on environmental technologies to reduce CFC gases and CO2 emissions with and without an agreed UN Protocol. The insights gained are explored in our policy section. Our analysis suggests the need for a more nuanced approach to patent policy that is embedded in the wider context of innovation systems and takes account of the anomalies raised by CPRs. For CPR protecting innovations subject to positive network externalities, we advocate that policy should prioritise diffusion over private incentives for R&D and use alternative policies to patents to stimulate investment in R&D.en
dc.description.statusPeer revieweden
dc.description.versionPublished Versionen
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen
dc.identifier.articleid104850en
dc.identifier.citationBustamante, J., Oughton, C., Pesque-Cela, V. and Tobin, D. (2023) ‘Resolving the patents paradox in the era of COVID-19 and climate change: Towards a patents taxonomy’, Research Policy, 52(9), 104850 (17 pp). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2023.104850en
dc.identifier.doi10.1016/j.respol.2023.104850en
dc.identifier.endpage17en
dc.identifier.issn0048-7333en
dc.identifier.issued8en
dc.identifier.journaltitleResearch Policyen
dc.identifier.startpage1en
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10468/14740
dc.identifier.volume52en
dc.language.isoenen
dc.publisherElsevieren
dc.relation.ispartofResearch Policyen
dc.rights© 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)en
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/en
dc.subjectPatentsen
dc.subjectCommon pool resourcesen
dc.subjectInnovation diffusionen
dc.subjectIPRen
dc.subjectIntellectual property rightsen
dc.titleResolving the patents paradox in the era of COVID-19 and climate change: Towards a patents taxonomyen
dc.typeArticle (peer-reviewed)en
oaire.citation.issue9en
oaire.citation.volume52en
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