So now a number of people have asked me to explain what "the" libertarian position on IP is. This question comes up because IP is "intellectual property" and since libertarians are generally big on property, it leads some to wonder why many are not big on IP. So I am going to do a series to explain this. (Roderick Long wrote a paper on this topic some years back, from the perspective of someone who used to support IP and then decided not too, I'm going to be coming at it from the other direction.)

So first of all, libertarian or classical liberal views on IP break down as follows:

--Rejects patent and copyright (law professor Tom Bell, Cato VP Tom Palmer), or very suspicious of copyright and patent (economist F.A. Hayek, Thomas Jefferson).

--Copyright is okay, but patent is not (I have heard people place Hayek in this camp, but could not find supporting quotes from him off hand, maybe someone will email me).

--Both patent and copyright are okay (law prof Richard Epstein, David Friedman, Herbert Spencer, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton).

That about covers the gamut, note that the only view not represented at all as far as I know is that patent is okay but copyright is not.

So the next question, why? There are many types of arguments made in support of libertarian policies generally--arguments from natural rights, arguments from various types of utilitarianism, ethical arguments, arguments from public choice. With so many different starting points, it's actually surprising that libertarians ever end up in the same place. But on IP, they don't.

Visit again next week for Part II, when I begin reviewing the various views in greater details. I think I'll start with the argument that property rights in ideas are inherently incoherent.