Editorial

Innovation and Creativity

Throughout the world, states are clamouring for the encouragement of innovation and creativity. From India and China to Europe, the United States and Japan, one of the principal keys to future economic success is recognized as proficiency in the development of inventiveness and high technology. It is, however, one thing to proclaim the need for encouragement, but quite another to identify the best methods of making encouragement a reality. In successive “Green Papers” (public discussion documents) on the problem, the European Union has agonised over the need to stimulate innovation and the most effective and economical ways of achieving this end.

Of many suggestions put forward by the Brussels Commission, the improvement of intellectual property protection is given a high priority. The usual arguments in favour of sound intellectual property laws are given. They protect investment; they offer an incentive to creative people; they provide publicity for inventions, while protecting the interests of the inventors. All these are perfectly good points. At the same time, a great deal depends on the nature of the improvements in intellectual property laws generally and of patent law in particular. At their worst, copyright laws may have the unintentional effect of stifling creativity; and, when patent laws involve excessive costs for the inventor, much of their benefit may be lost. In any reforms of intellectual property laws, it is essential for the fundamental aim of protection to be looked at afresh, to ensure that the laws genuinely stimulate innovation and creativity.

Outside the intellectual property field, there are many suggestions for ways in which inventiveness may be encouraged. Most of these are beyond the scope of this online journal. But two are worth mentioning briefly, if only to point a contrast in methods of tackling the problem. In Europe, it has recently been announced that state aids, which are normally unlawful, such as subsidies, tax concessions and the like, to otherwise competitive industries, will continue to be permissible in general for the purposes of research and development. This may or may not be economically sound. In the United States, the encouragement of inventiveness is directed at future inventors: the young people, especially between the ages of 16 and 18, who already show a flair for creativity, whether in the sciences or in the humanities. Towards the end of April this year, some of the brightest and best of America’s young innovators gathered to present the results of their individual and group projects at the Junior Science and Humanities Symposium in San Diego, California.* They competed for valuable awards and prizes: they were being given practical encouragement to pursue their flair for research. (Some of them even elected to listen to a talk on intellectual property protection.) The enthusiasm and expertise shown by the participants gave grounds for hoping that the future of technological development was bright. [10009]

*Those interested in the Symposium may wish to check out www.jshs.org and to look at “National Symposium”. The Symposium is run by the Academy of Applied Science, the parent body of the Patent, Trademark and Copyright Research Foundation, in association with the US Department of Defense and a large number of American universities and private volunteers.