ABSTRACT
Intellectual property protects ideas by means of exclusive rights. It must be understood why such legal protection should be provided. This must be done in the face of past and continuing criticism of intellectual property rights. The justifications given for granting exclusive rights, then, provide an important framework for critical evaluation of the effectiveness of intellectual property rights as we know them. The success of the substantive law can only be assessed in the light of the objectives that law was designed to achieve.
