The Global Battle Over Intellectual Property

Governance of intellectual property (IP) at the international level has in recent decades become one of the most contentious issues in international political economy. It is also enormously complex and dynamic. In The Global Battle Over Intellectual Property, the eminent international relations scholar Susan K. Sell focuses on why IP is such a contested field. The reasons are many. The current IP regime's distributional consequences across countries are highly uneven. There has been a proliferation of international IP forums, sometimes working at cross purposes and striving for different goals. The ever-increasing complexity of the regime raises profound questions about representation and legitimacy. While there is clearly a set of powerful stakeholders, whether they are the right ones or not is an open question. To address the range of these related issues, Sell focuses on the dynamics driving change and the implications they have for governance and implementing more equitable policies.