De Facto Protection for Intellectual Property: Evidence from Software Piracy

What explains the large variations in de facto protection across countries even as seemingly similar formal regulations in a number of sectors have proliferated across the world? While the literature has emphasized rather stable domestic characteristics such as administrative capacity and regime type in explaining the variation of de facto outcomes, this paper builds on diffusion studies to argue that the extent of de facto intellectual property protection of a country is systematically conditioned by practices of other countries in the global system. International diffusion pressures of coercion, competition and emulation have a direct effect on practices by altering the relative costs and benefits. They also have an indirect effect by empowering nonstate advocates with the tools to pressure their governments. Data based on the effective copyright protection for computer programs during the period 1994-2005 provide support for the arguments.