Private Law Theory

ABSTRACT
Incentives-based utilitarian arguments justify intellectual property rights as tools to bring about good consequences. By promising and protecting various rights, institutions of intellectual property-copyright, patent, trade secret-incentivize authors and inventors to create new and useful intellectual works. This innovation, in turn, leads to higher levels of health and wellbeing for everyone. A second kind of justification offered for intellectual property is the natural rights tradition championed by John Locke. In general, the intuition is that laboring, producing, thinking, and persevering are voluntary, and individuals who engage in these activities are entitled to what they produce. Subject to certain restrictions, rights are generated when individuals mix their labor with unowned objects or when they create new intellectual works.

Moore, Adam D, Intellectual Property, Personality, and Misrepresentation (January 4, 2026).