Patents

4A New Place under the Sun for Patents?

4.1. Introduction

The debate about patents and their ability to effectively stimulate innovation often tends to be polarized between opinions for or against patents. This polarization immediately begs the question of what would replace the patent system if it was abolished, or even if it should be replaced by anything. Replacing it with another innovation support mechanism would require careful weighing of the respective pros and cons of the competing systems. Abolishing it without replacing it would be to disregard several centuries of reflection and controversy that would not lead to a definitive conclusion, unless the rules of the game for innovation drastically changed. The argument raised here is rather that we must find a way to successfully and intelligently connect patents with other innovation support systems, or even other approaches to innovation, which are complements to patents rather than substitutes for them.

First (section 4.2), the relationship between patents and other innovation policy tools is discussed. This section focuses primarily on the mechanism of innovation awards, which are sometimes presented as a promising alternative. Through historical elements concerning past experiences with this system and more theoretical elements comparing its merits and faults with those of patents, this section suggests that innovation prizes cannot be considered unequivocally preferable to patents. On the contrary, it appears ...