earticle

영어

The rationales of the justification of intellectual property rights have been mainly expounded by utilitarian perspectives. However, the utilitarian perspectives do not provide the adequate justification of intellectual property rights in the current knowledge based society. The justification based on natural right perspectives may provide an alternative solution to the current knowledge based society. Especially Lockean theory among natural right perspectives provides in-depth rationales in the knowledge based society. In this paper, I argue that the distinction between trade secrets and patents are expound by the different feature between the state of nature and the civil society of Locke. Trade secrets can be recognized as the property in the state of nature while patents can be regarded as the property in the civil society. For ideas can be privatized as a form of trade secrets in the state of nature in which laws do not exist; the idea can be privatized as a form of patents in the civil society in which laws exist. This means that the patent as a legal monopoly on ideas in the civil society are a legal device for promoting the social surplus. Conclusively, Locke's theory is based not only on the natural right perspective but on the utilitarian perspective.