THE STATUS AND LEGAL EFFECT OF COMPULSORY LICENSE IN INVESTMENT LAW
International Journal of Law (JoL), 1 (1):
33-46 (2018)Abstract
Compulsory license is one of the main flexibilities that developing countries are allowed to use by the International Intellectual Property Law system in order to facilitate access to medicines and technology transfer. Despite the fact that this amounts to the deprivation of the right for exclusive use of the inventor, it is indeed a quite acceptable measure when it falls under the conditions set in Article 31 of TRIPS. However, the use of this flexibility might bring claims by investors before the investment arbitration, where the compulsory license is highly contested. In the current paper, we examine the status of this flexibility in both intellectual property and investment law regimes and we attempt to assess the defence of use of compulsory license before the international investment arbitration so as to examine if international investment law is true obstacle for the use of flexibilities available by the International Intellectual Property regime.