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Copyright Legacy and Developing Countries: Important Lessons for Nigeria’s Emerging Copyright Reform

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Copyright, Property and the Social Contract

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Abstract

For about half a century of development policy and scholarship, the debate on the relationship between copyright and development with particular reference to developing countries has continued to renew itself over and over. The intensity of that debate underscores the pervasive role of copyright as an important intellectual property (IP) in developing countries and one without which the contemporary development narratives are incomplete. The narratives construct complex and dynamic issue linkages in the global copyright and development frameworks. As a background to the discourse, this chapter introduces IP through the lens of development. It revisits the foundations of copyright from its philosophical, technological and normative premises and as a legacy institution bequeathed by a Western knowledge system to developing countries. The chapter examines the emergence of access to knowledge (A2K) as an important concern for the future role of copyright in developing countries with the focus on Nigeria and its emerging copyright reform. The chapter argues that development in a developing country like Nigeria is undermined where the population is denied access to copyright materials, which can enhance access to education and knowledge that is critically needed for socio-economic and technological development. It concludes that Nigeria’s new Copyright Bill offers a quantum leap to the next copyright dispensation for the new digital environment.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Dutfield and Suthersanen (2008), p. 272.

  2. 2.

    See generally Sen (1983), pp. 745–762; Sen (1984); Sen (1985a), pp. 169–221; Sen (1985b).

  3. 3.

    Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, Mar 20 1883, 21 UST 1583, 828 UNTS 305; Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, Sept. 9, 1886, 1161 UNTS 3.

  4. 4.

    Halbert (2007), pp. 253, 262.

  5. 5.

    See Convention Establishing WIPO (Stockholm) 14 July 1967 as amended September 1979, Article 3.

  6. 6.

    References to Right to development (RtD), first proclaimed in 1986, can be found in all major UN documents. It was first adopted at the 1993 Vienna World Conference on Human Rights (Vienna Declaration). See para 10, Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action. (“The World Conference on Human Rights reaffirms the right to development, as established in the Declaration on the Right to Development, as a universal and inalienable right and an integral part of fundamental human rights.” (A/CONF.157/23)). RtD, which connotes a dualistic and rights-based approach to development, aims at the development of individual persons and peoples on a national and international level See Kirchmeier (2006).

  7. 7.

    See UNDP Human Development Reports available at www.UNDP.int. See also UNCTAD Economic Development in Africa Series; and also Least Developed Countries (LDC) Reports available at www.unctad.org.

  8. 8.

    Chon (2007), p. 803.

  9. 9.

    See Wong and Dutfield (2011), p. 4.

  10. 10.

    Locke (1690).

  11. 11.

    See Okediji (2006), p. ix.

  12. 12.

    The first Copyright Statute is the English Statute of Anne 1709/10.

  13. 13.

    See Berne Convention for the Protection for Literary and Artistic Works 1886.

  14. 14.

    The signatory countries include United Kingdom, France, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Italy and Switzerland. Others include Haiti, Liberia and Tunisia.

  15. 15.

    Okedji (2014), p. 191. Okedji (1999), pp. 117, 149–150.

  16. 16.

    Landes and Posner (2004), pp. 1–4.

  17. 17.

    Benkler (1999), p. 354; Boyle (2003), p. 3.

  18. 18.

    The development of the human right narrative of IP, which has traversed the landscapes of civil, political, cultural, social and economic rights with their respective international legal texts can be considered as part of the copyright and development debate. From the original UDHR ratified by over 150 nations, which affirmed the protection of creators right in the famous article 27 that “everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he (or she) is the author” to the International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and its Social, Cultural and Economic counterpart (ICESCR) coupled with the international human right system, the interface of IPR and human rights has been mapped. The Paris, Berne and Rome Convention including the more recent TRIPs agreement neither link or connect IPR with human rights nor refer to them as ‘right’ in the context of human rights. Thus, the jurisprudential divergence of the trio legal regimes were apparent, largely result in major concerns of IP regime in the gradual expansion of IPR found in the revisions in the existing multilateral conventions coupled with the linkage between IPR and trade specifically under the TRIPs agreement. Part of that development that prospered the isolation of an IPR has given way to the increasing association and linkage of the two regimes. The expanding matrix of both human right and IP system converged at some point.

  19. 19.

    See WSIS Geneva Declaration OF principles 2003 in Document WSIS – 03/GENEVA/Doc/4 E, 117 available online at http://www.itu.int/net/wsis/docs/geneva/official/dop.html accessed 10 May 2016. (Geneva Declaration).

  20. 20.

    See Geneva Declaration at 117.

  21. 21.

    See WSIS Geneva Declaration, paragraph 25.

  22. 22.

    See WSIS Geneva Declaration, paragraph 28.

  23. 23.

    Okedji (2008), pp. 274 at 277.

  24. 24.

    Sunder (2006), pp. 257, 319.

  25. 25.

    See Adewopo (2012), p. 43.

  26. 26.

    See Kaczynski (2008), p. 804. See also Krikovian and Kapczynski (2010) (discussing the framing process, the evolution and operation of AZK as a movement).

  27. 27.

    See Abdel Latif (2012), p. 99.

  28. 28.

    See Halbert (2007). See also Vaver (2000), pp. 621–637; Ghidini (2011), pp. 75–79.

  29. 29.

    Larkin (2014). See also Lunney (2001), p. 813; Boyle (2004), pp. 1–12.

  30. 30.

    David (2004), pp. 5–10; See also Nimmer (1995), pp. 1385.

  31. 31.

    See Boyle (2004), p. 1.

  32. 32.

    See arts. 7 & 8, TRIPS Agreement.

  33. 33.

    See Von Lewinski (2008), p. 152.

    See also Okedji (2006).

  34. 34.

    See Okedji, International Copyright system, 29 (note 33).

  35. 35.

    See Okedji, 32.

  36. 36.

    Treaty to facilitate Access to published works for persons who are blind, visually impaired or otherwise print disabled Adopted by the Diplomatic Conference in Marrakesh, Morocco in 27, June 2013.

  37. 37.

    UN report, World Population to reach 9.6 billion by 2050(13 June 2013), available at http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=45165#.Uhv1GtJmjTo.

  38. 38.

    Wikipedia, Demographics of Nigeria., available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigeria#Demographics.

  39. 39.

    Dying for Change Poor People’s experience of health and ill-health, a joint undertaking between WHO and World Bank available at http://www.who.int/hdp/publications/dying_change.pdf.

  40. 40.

    Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 10 December 1948, 217 A (III), available at: http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/3ae6b3712c.html (1948).

  41. 41.

    UN News Centre, Literacy vital for beating poverty and disease and reinforcing stability – UN, available at http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=39485&Cr=literacy&Cr1#.USQB_h1BP-Y.

  42. 42.

    Dele Ogbodo, Nigeria Now Uses 29% of Africa’s Internet Access an Interview with Nigerian Minister of Communication Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson (2015) Thisday http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/nigeria-now-uses-29-of-africa-s-internet-access/209661/ .

  43. 43.

    Zacheaus Somorin, Apple Buys Chinedu Echeruo’s Hopstop.com for $1 Billion http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/apple-buys-chinedu-echeruo-s-hopstop-com-for-1-billion/209739/ .

  44. 44.

    Harnad, What is Open Access, http://www.eprints.org/openaccess/. Harnad, Mitteilungen der VÖB, (2012). Harnad et al. (2008).

  45. 45.

    Cornell University Library, arXiv.org.

  46. 46.

    Queensland University of Technology, QUT ePrints, available at http://eprints.qut.edu.au/.

  47. 47.

    Harnad et al. (2008). Institutions have recognised the efficacy of this route and that providing institutional support to staff or recipients of grants would enable access to the output of research and indeed the introduction of institutional mandates by governments, funding agencies and Institutions of higher learning have brought about higher deposits into repositories.

  48. 48.

    Budapest Open Access Initiative. 2002.

  49. 49.

    Adewopo (2015), pp. 3–5.

  50. 50.

    See Copyright Act, 2nd Schedule.

  51. 51.

    See UNESCO Education for all global monitoring report (2009).

  52. 52.

    See Art 26(i) available at www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/accessed 23 April 2016.

  53. 53.

    National Universities Commission, LIST OF NIGERIAN UNIVERSITIES AND YEARS FOUNDED.

  54. 54.

    AJOL, African Journals Online, available at http://www.ajol.info/.

  55. 55.

    See Parts 1–11, Draft Copyright Bill 2015.

  56. 56.

    See generally Part 11, Draft Copyright Bill 2015.

  57. 57.

    See Sunder (2006), pp. 257, 311.

  58. 58.

    See other instruments like ICSCR, CBD etc.

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  1. Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, Abuja, Nigeria

    Adebambo Adewopo

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  1. School of Law, Australian Catholic University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    John Gilchrist

  2. School of Law, Australian Catholic University, Brisbane, QLD, Australia

    Brian Fitzgerald

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Adewopo, A. (2018). Copyright Legacy and Developing Countries: Important Lessons for Nigeria’s Emerging Copyright Reform. In: Gilchrist, J., Fitzgerald, B. (eds) Copyright, Property and the Social Contract. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95690-9_1

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