“Towards a New International Economic and Legal Order for Sustainable Development”
Reforming Intellectual Property, Trade and Investment Law in the COVID-19 era
-The central argument developed in this book is to demonstrate how strengthening existent IPRs and Bilateral Trade and Investment Agreements in developing countries and LDCs may strongly affect access to medicines, treatments and needed vaccines in the context of Covid-19 and environmental protection as the prices of life-saving medicines increase for the benefit of Transnational Interest Blocks located in developed countries that continue to benefit from existent international intellectual property rules beyond WTO Agreements.
-Furthermore, the recent proliferation of Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs) has led to many developing countries being sued by transnational corporations, resulting in the overturning of many health, safety, and environmental laws, as well as awards in the billions of dollars from taxpayers to corporations which in my view is a big challenge for the realization of Third Generation Human Rights and Sustainable Development Goals.
-Then, I will elaborate on how developing countries should seek to collaborate and create a new legal system in order to foster local innovation and spur competition domestically and regionally. Developing countries must take the lead in policy design and intellectual property innovation and reform in order to offset new protectionist tendencies in developed countries and help LDCs to become truly independent and accomplish their own development objectives as well.
-The international trading system, neoclassical economics and the old economic model based on unlimited growth and the irrational exhaustion of world resources and environmental limits governing today's transactions are kicking away the ladder for new Sustainable Development goals. Neoliberalism tends to put a lot of weight on efficiency and markets while neglecting equity, democracy and human life, and health over profit hoarding.
-International pressures from developed countries and multinational firms were a consistent and omnipresent part of the context for TRIPS implementation for all developing countries. Developing country governments face intense international pressures to go beyond minimum TRIPS requirements, limit their use of TRIPS flexibilities, and introduce IP protection at a faster pace than TRIPS requires.
-Other relevant question from a competition and international transfer of technology perspective to be developed is whether or not the TRIPS Agreement is contributing to reduce the productivity difference or technology gap between nations. Why certain firms from certain nations often preserve technological advantages for many decades in industries, instead of inevitably losing their lead as technology gap theories would suggest? Is the TRIPS Agreement fulfilling the objectives of transfer of technologies?
-No one knows better what is needed in an LDC community than an inventor who lives there. Why and how do international corporations make particular nations develop skills and know-how in certain industries and others do not? How could multinationals and the private sector be involved in developing a coherent and global framework for technology transfer that would be enforceable and good for sustainable development through the creation of a Global Governance Authority for Sustainable Development, ITT, and Innovation?
Ultimately, this book makes the case for a concerted, multi-stakeholder effort in moving towards a new paradigm: a paradigm in which fair trade, competition law, and global investment are integrated means moving away from the traditional theories of trade that look only at costs and excluding ontological and philosophical considerations that are relevant from a legal perspective on International Law. By moving from the comparative to the competitive advantage of a nation, the new theory must reflect a broad conception of competition that includes sustainable production and consumption, segmented markets, differentiated products, technology differences, and economies of scale.
The question is whether the IPRs system helps to reach a global balance in this sense? This implies rewriting a New Global Economic and Legal Order which incorporates social welfare and sustainable production and consumption and the development of social business and real means for redistribution of wealth in order to transfer power to the people, in other words, a more democratic, fair and a new power-sharing system.
Access the first part at the following link:
If you would like to get the full e-book ( 228 p.p. 67.000 words) please send an e-mail to: elitsd.org@gmail.com or david.betancourt@live.com