When I was a U.S. Government trade negotiator, South Korea was a challenging country, frequently finding itself toward the bottom of U.S. Government rankings of foreign intellectual property systems. Improving a country’s IP requires foresight and political will. A nation needs to be willing to set aside the short-term gains from copying others and look to the future of building an innovation-based economy. And they need to stay the course, rejecting temptation to fall back into the easy but self-defeating path of copying.
The United States has done this over the course of its history, contributing to American leadership in innovative and creative sectors. To their credit, South Korea has moved considerably in this direction. It has been gratifying to see that country improve its IP system and enjoy the benefits, from the explosion of K-pop to Korean animation to high-tech innovation. And today we speak not only about U.S. firms investing in Korea, but Korean firms creating manufacturing jobs here in the U.S.
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