Systematizing and rebalancing EU copyright through the lens of property

Authors: Caterina Sganga

ABSTRACT

For decades now, the propertization of copyright has been viewed as the ultimate cause of many
of the distortions affecting contemporary copyright law, and the enclosure of knowledge that
has ensued. Although traces of this phenomenon are also present in the EU copyright
harmonization, scholars have classified it as a dogmatically incorrect and merely rhetorical use
of the proprietary label, hence not worthy of technical analysis, but only of repudiation and
correction of its effects. Running counter to majority opinion, and building on a range of
positive national examples of application of property rules and constitutional property
doctrines in copyright matters, this article proves that property may become the systematic
framework needed to solve a wide array of the most compelling balancing and interpretative
problems affecting EU copyright law.

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