This article does not purport to collect and analyze all Constitutional provisions
and decisions of the Latin American countries. Much to the contrary, by
gathering a few significant normative and court contributions from the region,
we will just try to sketch the relation between Intellectual Property and
fundamental laws as it takes its peculiar character from the South of Rio Grande
to the deeps of Patagonia.
In most Latin American jurisdictions, the Constitution includes at least one
Intellectual Property-related clause; and many of those inclusions date from XIX
Century. This is markedly distinct of the situation in the countries belonging to
the European Union or the Council of Europe, where specific Intellectual
Property provisions are not frequently found.
On the other hand, some Supreme or Constitutional Courts of the area have a
meaningful stream of decisions on IP issues , but others only rarely, if ever, take notice of the matter.
Therefore, even though it is not possible to identify a strong and coherent
regional construction of legal principles and solutions, and even less of clear
convergences, the geographical focus of this study deserves such attention.