TRIPS: Adequate Protection, Inadequate Trade, Adequate Competition Policy

This article analyzes the relationship between trade and competition policy with respect to intellectual property, focusing particularly on the inclusion into the Uruguay Round of the Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property ( TRIPS ). The article sets forth the traditional framework of protection as established by the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property in 1883. The TRIPS agreement provides new rules and principles to manage emerging problems in the field of industrial property. The main focus of this article is to analyze the effect that TRIPS will have on harmonizing (but not unifying) the system of intellectual property protection