Droit moral

DEFINITION

This French term for "moral right" refers particularly to certain rights which all civilizations should recognize are held by those who create intellectual properties ? artists (or their estates). These include artists' rights to: Attribution ? the right to be identified as the creator of a work Disclosure ? the right to decide when and where to publish the work Withdrawal ? the right to withdraw a work from circulation Integrity ? the right to preserve the integrity of the work Discussions of droit moral eventually turn to the extent to which moral rights should be tied to monetary rights, and the extent to which moral rights should be alienable. The concept of droit moral is the basis for all copyright laws. The Berne Convention is the premiere treaty governing international copyrights. Almost every major developed country has signed on to this treaty. An important variation from the Berne Convention: France's (and some other countrys') laws go farther than those of the US (and some other countries) in holding that each and every time a work is purchased, a share of monies paid should go to the artist.(French pr. dwah moh-rahl)Related resource: In her essay, "The Moral Roghts of Droit Moral: France's example of Art as the Physical Manifestation of the Artist," Sheri Lyn Falco, Esq., says "The French system, unlike the American system, statutorily recognizes four separate categories of moral rights: (1) the right of disclosure, (2) the right of attribution, (3) the right of integrity, and (4) the right of retraction . . . . Moreover, the French recognition of these rights extends to a wider array of artists, and is not confined to as limited a category of authors as is the American codified recognition of moral rights. (In America we only give a specific group of Visual Artist's a few Moral Rights; no such rights are afforded to Musicians, Sculptors, audiovisual Artists, filmmakers, etc.)"