This symposium will explore initiatives directed at achieving just, cost-effective, efficient, and fair resolutions of disputes about rights in creative works and products. Its key focus will be on access to justice in the global creative economy, an increasingly important topic, as different nations have developed new initiatives in dispute resolution in this field.

Laws, especially intellectual property legislation, around the world are increasing in sophistication as domestic, regional, and international laws respond to the challenges of new technologies. But the promises of these measures will not be realised without appropriate and accessible systems for the resolution of disputes, such as mediation and arbitration. Speakers will discuss and analyse the different contributions that public initiatives and private ordering strategies can make to enhancing access to justice in the creative economies.

The topics discussed at this conference are relevant to individual authors, cultural organisations, the public sector, private firms, distribution platforms, established firms, and SMEs, etc. All parties involved in the creative economies have a stake in the issues to be examined.  From a systemic perspective, the access to justice questions explored in this conference concern the contributions domestic legal systems can make to the flourishing of the creative sector, and, ultimately, to the international legal order.