International protection of intellectual property rights

Objective of this dissertation is to examine countries\u27 incentives for Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) protection, in particular in the case of developing countries. In the first essay, a model of repeated patent races is used to show how a country with innovative potential may nonetheless maintain inadequate IPR protection. I find that this is due to a time inconsistency problem intrinsic to IPR protection: ex ante strong protection is warranted to promote innovation, but once discovery takes place there is an incentive to lower protection in the case of unsuccessful local innovation. In more technologically advanced economies reputational considerations may be sufficient to maintain strong protection. Otherwise a commitment mechanism, such as participation in WTO, or, more controversially, some form of bilateral punishment, may serve to increase welfare by increasing the level of innovation in the economy. In the second essay I examine the more general case of two countries which must interdependently choose their level of IPR protection. With respect to the one country case, a higher level of technological development will be necessary in both countries for the high IPR protection outcome to be supported. In the more general case of n countries, the world tends to divide into a high protection group and a low protection group. In the third essay I consider the effect of imperfect intellectual property rights on technology transfer and on the pattern of trade between two countries with different levels of technological development. Imperfect patent protection and imitation are introduced in a two country endogenous growth model with two activities, production and innovation. Assuming that imitation affects both activities, the backward country faces the following trade off: with weaker protection less technology enters the country, but what does enter can be more effectively exploited. If protection isn\u27t too strong, it will shift the comparative advantage of research in favor of the laggard country