Abstract

The Agreement Establishing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) includes cooperation on intellectual property rights (IPRs) on the assumption that IPR enforcement will promote cultural and economic growth in Africa. I challenge this assumption based on economic and historical evidence. I affirm that copyright leads to economic inefficiencies, can be an instrument of censorship and grants monopoly extra-profits to multinational firms and not (except in very rare cases) an adequate remuneration to the authors of cultural works. A wider and stricter application of copyright in ...