OECD Culture and Local Development.pdf - PACA

CONCLUSION - DESIGNING LOCAL PUBLIC POLICIES
From the local development viewpoint, the real challenge today relates to
idiosyncratic products of what are usually called the art crafts. These products are
vulnerable to copying and counterfeiting, and they usually have no possibility of
obtaining copyright or a patent, or even a trademark. The question, then, is whether
some minimal form of protection can be given to the geographic origin of cultural products,
in the way agricultural products benefit from designations of origin. Currently, industrial
goods cannot use these territorial labels, and must rely on their own trademark.
There is a great deal of controversy over the introduction of such protection,
which is in effect labelling. Debates within the European Commission and in the
World Trade Organisation have done little to move the idea forward.
Some countries have therefore adopted another approach, providing for labels
that allow creators to achieve greater visibility, at least, and to make use of existing
mechanisms in their country. This is the case in Japan, with the “Living National
Treasure” label, and in France, with the “Living Heritage Enterprise” label.
In both cases, the intention is to recognise the specific features of a craft or an
enterprise and to highlight the originality of the knowledge and skills involved, and
its economic vulnerability. The need to maintain and, one day, to pass on their
knowledge, the problem of finding rare or almost unavailable materials, and the
difficulty of making contact with buyers means that these individuals and firms must
operate within constraints for which they are not always prepared, and which they
may not even recognise. The purpose of the label, then, is to draw attention to these
situations and help to sustain the specific art.
Preventing a tragedy of artistic property privatisation
In contrast to the risk discussed above, there is today the threat that intellectual
property rights will be extended well beyond their appropriate application. Recognising
property in the content and not only in the expression (which is generally accepted)
will constrain the use of ideas or allusions that are already public and will prevent
some creators or innovators from defining new products. This represents a kind of
entry barrier to the market in ideas, a barrier that is particularly objectionable if the
first person to put an idea to use is not necessarily its inventor. At the local level this
poses some paradoxes: the originators of a musical or decorative theme may suddenly
find that their own “work” has been protected by someone else, and that they now
have to pay to use it. Local governments would surely do well to conduct an inventory
and take steps themselves to protect the intellectual resources in their territory.
Local policies for promoting creativity
Culture and creativity districts can appear in many contexts, but they can never
be artificial or automatic. Recognising that such a district cannot be willed into
162 CULTURE AND LOCAL DEVELOPMENT - ISBN 92-64-00990-6 - © OECD 2005