International copyright relations of Russia
Encyclopedia
The international copyright relations of Russia were virtually non-existent in the Imperial Russia and during much of the history of the Soviet Union
. Under the Tsars, only a few bilateral copyright treaties with other nations were concluded; these treaties moreover were weak and of short duration. The treaties from Imperial times had all run out by end of the war.
After the October Revolution
, the Soviet Union had no international copyright relations until 1967, when a first treaty with Hungary
was concluded. In 1973, the USSR then joined the Universal Copyright Convention
(UCC), establishing copyright relations with Western countries. More bilateral treaties followed, including two with Western countries (Austria
in 1981 and Sweden
in 1986), until the government announced its intention to join the Berne Convention
in 1989. The USSR was dissolved before that plan could be realized. The Russian Federation acceded to the Berne Convention in 1994; the treaty entered in force in Russia on March 13, 1995.
and in July 1862 with Belgium
. Both treaties provided for reciprocal copyright protection, but were limited to literature only; translation rights were not covered, and censorship was explicitly allowed. Both treaties were abrogated in 1887.
Under Western pressure, new treaties were concluded in 1904 with Germany
, in 1905 with France, and in 1906 with Austria-Hungary
. After the new copyright law of 1911 was passed, new or renewed treaties were concluded with Germany (1911), France (1911), Belgium (1913/14), and Denmark
(1915). All these treaties provided for reciprocal copyright protection and also included the author's translation rights, which were protected for a period of ten years from the original publication of a work. These treaties were of short duration only and expired after three to five years. Tsarist Russia even planned to join the Berne Convention
in the early 20th century, but that was, according to Stoyanovitch, prevented by the outbreak of World War I
.
After the October Revolution
, the Soviet Union initially had no international copyright relations at all. During the period of the New Economic Policy
(NEP), the Soviet regime unsuccessfully tried to conclude new bilateral copyright treaties with Great Britain
, Germany, and Italy
. After these failed attempts, the USSR maintained an isolationist policy in copyright matters until the late 1960s. A first bilateral copyright treaty with Hungary became effective on November 17, 1967, and on October 8, 1971, a second treaty with Bulgaria
followed. Both treaties provided for reciprocal copyright protection with a general term of 15 years p.m.a. and also explicitly defined reciprocity for free uses.
On February 27, 1973, the Soviet Union deposited with the UNESCO
its declaration of accession to the Geneva version of 1952 of the Universal Copyright Convention
(UCC). Three months later, on May 27, 1973, the UCC entered in force with respect to the USSR, establishing copyright relations with Western countries. The USSR timed its accession to the UCC to occur before the 1971 Paris version of the UCC entered in force. Once the Paris version had become effective, accessions to the earlier Geneva version were no longer possible. The USSR would then have been forced to implement the somewhat stronger provisions of the 1971 Paris version, which in particular explicitly recognized an author's exclusive rights to reproduction, performance, and broadcast of a work. Such neighbouring rights did not exist in Soviet law.
With the accession of the Soviet Union to the UCC, Soviet works published on or after May 27, 1973 became eligible to copyright in all other signatory countries of the UCC. Conversely, foreign works became copyrighted in the Soviet Union by virtue of the UCC if they were published on or after May 27, 1973 and the publication occurred in a UCC country or the author was a citizen of a UCC country.
There were initially fears in the West that the Soviet authorities could misuse the provisions of the UCC to censor undesirable works abroad: the regime could compulsorily purchase the copyright on such works without the authors' consent and then sue in foreign courts against the publication of Soviet works abroad, since the copyright would be owned by the state. However, this did not occur. Evidently, the Soviet authorities considered the measures provided by its other laws—in particular articles 70 and 190(1) of the RSFSR Criminal Code on anti-Soviet agitation—sufficient to deal with dissident
s without needing to resort to actions based on the copyright law. Furthermore, such actions would have badly damaged the prestige of the USSR abroad, and it was doubtful whether foreign countries would have honored such nationalizations. The U.S. included in its Copyright law of 1976 an article 201(e) that explicitly invalidated all involuntary transfers of copyright. This provision was included in the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976
precisely to prevent attempts of the Soviet government to employ the UCC to censor dissidents' works in the U.S.—although no such attempts had occurred yet and didn't occur afterwards.
Despite having joined the UCC, the Soviet Union continued its policy of bilateral agreements. New treaties with the German Democratic Republic
(effective November 21, 1973), Poland
(October 4, 1974), and Czechoslovakia
(March 18, 1975) were concluded. The 1967 treaty with Hungary had already been prolonged in 1971 and was again renewed in 1977, the treaty with Bulgaria was renewed in 1975. The treaties with Hungary and Czechoslovakia also included a provision for the protection of the moral rights "without limitation in time". In 1981, the first bilateral treaty with a Western country was signed: the copyright treaty with Austria
entered in force on December 16, 1981. On May 30, 1985, a treaty with Cuba
followed, and in 1986 the second treaty with a Western country was concluded with Sweden
. All these post-UCC treaties went beyond the provisions of the UCC because they were applied retroactively and explicitly applied also to works published before the USSR had joined the UCC and that were still copyrighted in their source country in 1973. (The treaty with Austria was amended to cover such pre-1973 works in 1989.) On April 19, 1989, another copyright treaty with Madagascar
was concluded. The treaty with the German Democratic Republic was rescinded by the USSR on June 2, 1991, following confusions about its continued applicability after the German reunification
.
On October 20, 1988, the USSR acceded to the Brussels Convention about measures against the unauthorized (re-)distribution of satellite transmissions. The treaty became effective for Russia from January 20, 1989 on. Also in 1989, the Soviet government announced its intention to join the Berne Convention, but the USSR was dissolved before that plan could be realized.
The changing economy in the Soviet Union led to the conclusion of a trade treaty between the USSR and the United States
, signed by presidents Gorbachev and Bush
on June 1, 1990. In this treaty, the U.S. imposed a number of measures in the field of intellectual property in exchange for granting the USSR most-favoured-nation
status. The treaty obliged the USSR to accede to the Berne Convention and to implement in its law a neighbouring rights scheme similar to what the Rome Convention laid down. The USSR agreed in the treaty to take substantive steps to amend its legislation in that sense by 1991. The treaty was ratified by the U.S. on December 23, 1991. The Soviet side no longer could do so, but the Russian Federation did so on June 12, 1992.
On June 25, 1993, Russia and Armenia
signed a treaty on the mutual protection of copyrights. To clarify the copyright situation amongst the states that had made up the former Soviet Union, the Commonwealth of Independent States
(CIS) nations agreed on a cooperation agreement in the field of copyrights on September 24, 1993. This "Moscow agreement" declared that all signatory countries considered themselves bound by the UCC as of the date the USSR had joined and would confirm this state with the UNESCO
, which administered the UCC. The treaty also defined that the treaty states would apply the UCC amongst themselves, also for works published before May 27, 1973 if those works had been copyrighted before this date according to the national laws of the successor states. This provision was subject to the rule of the shorter term
. The intent of the Moscow agreement was to avoid that older Soviet works became copyrighted in only some of the successor states, but would become part of the public domain in some of the others. The 1993 Moscow agreement entered in force in Russia on May 6, 1995.
During the same year, Russia and Switzerland
concluded a trade agreement in which they granted each other most-favoured-nation status concerning intellectual property rights, i.e., they agreed to grant the other treaty partner automatically and without conditions any trade advantage they'd grant a third country. This treaty entered in force on July 1, 1995. In a comprehensive trade treaty with the European Union
that was signed on June 24, 1994, Russia granted this most-favoured-nation status also to the EU member countries, excepting only trade advantages granted amongst the successor states of the USSR and also those Russia would grant a third country on an effective reciprocal basis. Because the ratification of this treaty was delayed as it had to be ratified by all EU members, an interim agreement containing only the provisions on intellectual property and the most-favoured-nation status was signed on July 17, 1995. It entered in force on February 1, 1996.
On November 3, 1994, the Russian government announced that the country would join three international treaties in the field of copyrights: the 1971 Paris version of the UCC including its annexes, the Geneva Phonograms Convention on unauthorized duplication and parallel import
of phonograms, and the Berne Convention. The accession documents to all three treaties were deposited on December 9, 1994. The UCC (Paris 1971 version) became effective for Russia on March 9, 1995. The Geneva Convention entered in force with respect to Russia on March 13, 1995 and was not retroactive: it covered only phonograms recorded after that date.
in Russia in 1995 would not be reprotected. As pre-1973 foreign works were not copyrighted at all and thus in the public domain in Russia in 1995, such works remained in the public domain in Russia. Russia thus got rather favorable conditions when it joined Berne Convention: Russian and Soviet works became copyrighted retroactively in other Berne countries, but pre-1973 works from those other countries did not become copyrighted in Russia.
This Russian interpretation was heavily criticized by Western countries and in particular by the United States
. Russian scholars, however, repeatedly (and, in the opinion of Elst, rightly) pointed out that there had been a very prominent precedent: in 1989, when the U.S. had joined the Berne Convention, they also had denied the retroactivity of the treaty. From 1989 until 1995, the U.S. only respected the copyrights under the Berne Convention on foreign works from another country that were published on or after the later of that country's adherence date to the Berne Convention and March 1, 1989 (the adherence date of U.S.), and on foreign works from a UCC country according to the provisions of the UCC, which meant on works that were published after the later of September 16, 1955 (the date the UCC entered in force for the U.S. and the other initial signatories) and the adherence date of the foreign UCC country. In the case of Russian or Soviet works, this meant that until 1996, the U.S. continued to recognize only copyrights on Soviet works published after May 27, 1973. The U.S. faced harsh critique for its unilateral denouncement of the retroactivity of the Berne Convention defined in article 18(1) BC. Ultimately, the U.S. had to reverse its position on that issue. It implemented the TRIPS agreement (a precondition to becoming a WTO
member) in its Uruguay Round Agreements Act
(URAA), which was signed into law on December 8, 1994. The URAA effectively restored the copyright in the U.S. on foreign works on January 1, 1996, if those works were until then not copyrighted in the U.S. because of a failure to meet the U.S. formalities (such as not bearing a copyright notice, or lacking registration with the U.S. Copyright Office) or because of a lack of international treaties between the U.S. and the source country of the work, if the work was still copyrighted in its source country on January 1, 1996.
Russian scholars have disputed this retroactivity issue at length. Gavrilov, for instance, who had argued for the Russian reservation to the Berne Convention, kept defending it, while others disagreed. Maggs and Sergeyev, for instance, pointed out in 2000 that the reservation was inadmissible under article 30(1) of the Berne Convention; Podshibikhin and Leontiev agreed in 2002. The modification of the copyright law through law 72-FL in 2004 refuelled the discussion, because this law added a new paragraph 4 to article 5 of the 1993 copyright law which clearly stated under which conditions foreign works were copyrighted in Russia, using a wording that corresponded in essence to articles 18(1) and 18(2) of the Berne Convention. Nevertheless, Gavrilov continued arguing in favour of the non-protection of pre-1973 foreign works, arguing that this was not so much a reservation to the Berne Convention but merely an interpretation, whereas others considered the 2004 amendments to finally do away with this reservation and claimed that law 72-FL restored copyright in Russia on pre-1973 foreign works. According to the Russian representative at the negotiations on Russia's accession to the WTO, law 72-FL indeed was intended to rescind the non-retroactivity reservation, thereby restoring copyrights on pre-1973 foreign works. The Russian copyright law (already before 2004) also considered international treaties self-executing and to take precedence over the Russian law (article 3). The common practice in Russia nevertheless did not change; pre-1973 foreign works were commonly considered to be uncopyrighted in Russia due to this reservation.
, the analogue of the Berne Convention for neighbouring rights. The adherence of Russia to the Rome Convention became effective on May 26, 2003. The Rome convention covered performances, phonograms, and broadcasts. For phonograms, it stipulated that phonograms produced by a national of a contracting state, or fixated in a contracting state, or published in a contracting state were covered, but allowed signatory countries to choose among the latter two (article 5). Russia chose to apply the criteria of nationality and publication, declaring the criterion of fixation as inapplicable in its adherence to the treaty. The Rome Convention is non-retroactive and applies only to phonograms created after and to performances or broadcasts that occurred after a country jointed the convention (article 20).
Until 2006, Russia had joined neither the WIPO Copyright Treaty nor the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty
. Its application to enter General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
(GATT) and to become a World Trade Organization
(WTO) member was postponed in 2001; negotiations were still ongoing in 2006. If and when Russia should become a WTO member, it would need to rescind its non-retroactivity reservation regarding the Berne Convention. Indeed Russia agreed in November 2006 to ensure that its new intellectual property legislation in part IV of the Civil Code, which was scheduled to enter in force on January 1, 2008, was fully TRIPS compliant.
In addition to the UCC, the bilateral treaties the USSR concluded with several countries, amongst them also two Western countries, made works of nationals of these countries eligible for copyright in the Soviet Union, even works published before May 27, 1973. In the case of Austria, Poland, and Sweden, this even applied to any work first published there, irrespective of the nationality of the author.
Since its accession to the Berne Convention in 1995, the following foreign works were copyrighted in Russia:
, Prokofiev
, and Myaskovsky
against the movie company 20th Century Fox
. 20th Century Fox had published a movie called The Iron Curtain, using music of these four composers as background music and crediting the composers. The four Soviet composers initiated legal actions against the movie company, claiming that the use of their names and music in a movie whose theme was objectionable to them and that was unsympathetic to the Soviet ideology libeled them and violated their civil rights. In the U.S., the courts dismissed these claims in Shostakovich v. Twentieth Century-Fox
(80 N.Y.S.2d 575
(N.Y. Sup. Ct. 1948), affirmed, 87 N.Y.S.2d 430 (N.Y. App. Div. 1949)), in particular because the works of these composers were in the public domain in the U.S. at that time because there were no international treaties relating to copyright between the U.S. and the USSR. The compositions themselves also had not been distorted, so the court found that the composers' moral right to the integrity of the work was not violated.
The four plaintiffs also went to court over this issue in France. Up to 1964, the French legislation treated both French authors and foreign authors exactly the same; works of both were granted exactly the same copyright protection. In a law suit that was ultimately decided by the French Court of Cassation
in 1959, the plaintiff
s won: the court ruled that works of foreign authors were entitled to copyright in France, and that the works of these four Soviet composers were thus copyrighted in France. It found their moral rights violated and ordered the film to be confiscated.
Another way by which Soviet works could become copyrighted outside of the Soviet Union was the smuggling of manuscripts out of the USSR to have the work first published abroad. This practice, known as tamizdat
in the Soviet Union, could result in serious repercussions for the authors in the USSR, but was still employed as one of the few ways the governmental censorship
could be bypassed. As a side effect, tamizdat works were granted copyright in the foreign country of first publication. If that country was a signatory of the UCC or the Berne Convention, the work was also granted copyright in all other signatories of these treaties, because they both extended copyright to works of citizens of non-member states, if these works were first published in a member state. A very famous case of a tamizdat publication was Boris Pasternak
's novel Doctor Zhivago
, which, after it had been refused by Soviet publishers, was first published in an Italian translation in Italy
in 1957. Because Italy was a member of both the UCC and the Berne Convention, the work was entitled to full copyright in all other member states of these two conventions. Pasternak was expelled from the Writers' Union
and, after he had been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature
in 1958, forced to decline acceptance of the award.
Early Soviet authors sometimes benefited from international copyright on their works just naturally. Maxim Gorky
and Sergei Prokofiev
, for instance, both had lived for some time abroad and published works in other countries that were members of the Berne Convention. These works of theirs were copyrighted in all other signatory countries of the Berne Convention. After the case of Doctor Zhivago, Soviet publishers became more aware of this possibility to have Soviet works covered by the Berne Convention. Soviet state organizations began to arrange for (simultaneous) first publication of some Soviet works in a country of the Berne Convention. For instance, Mikhail Sholokov's novel They Fought for Their Country was officially first published in Italy.
When the Soviet Union joined to the UCC, all Soviet works published on or after May 27, 1973 became eligible to copyright in all other signatory countries of the UCC. This state persisted until the dissolution of the USSR. When the USSR disintegrated, so did its copyright law. The split into fifteen independent states translated into a split into fifteen independent copyright laws, each with its own jurisdiction defined by the territory of the new successor state of the Soviet Union. Through the Moscow agreement, Soviet works first published in the RSFSR, which were thus subject to the Russian law, became eligible for copyright is all other CIS nations, even if they had been published before 1973.
Since its accession to the Berne Convention in 1995, the following Russian and Soviet works were copyrighted outside of Russia:
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
. Under the Tsars, only a few bilateral copyright treaties with other nations were concluded; these treaties moreover were weak and of short duration. The treaties from Imperial times had all run out by end of the war.
After the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
, the Soviet Union had no international copyright relations until 1967, when a first treaty with Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
was concluded. In 1973, the USSR then joined the Universal Copyright Convention
Universal Copyright Convention
The Universal Copyright Convention , adopted at Geneva in 1952, is one of the two principal international conventions protecting copyright; the other is the Berne Convention....
(UCC), establishing copyright relations with Western countries. More bilateral treaties followed, including two with Western countries (Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
in 1981 and Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
in 1986), until the government announced its intention to join the Berne Convention
Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, is an international agreement governing copyright, which was first accepted in Berne, Switzerland in 1886.- Content :...
in 1989. The USSR was dissolved before that plan could be realized. The Russian Federation acceded to the Berne Convention in 1994; the treaty entered in force in Russia on March 13, 1995.
Imperial Russia
First international copyright treaties were concluded in Spring 1861 with FranceFrance
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and in July 1862 with Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
. Both treaties provided for reciprocal copyright protection, but were limited to literature only; translation rights were not covered, and censorship was explicitly allowed. Both treaties were abrogated in 1887.
Under Western pressure, new treaties were concluded in 1904 with Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, in 1905 with France, and in 1906 with Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
. After the new copyright law of 1911 was passed, new or renewed treaties were concluded with Germany (1911), France (1911), Belgium (1913/14), and Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
(1915). All these treaties provided for reciprocal copyright protection and also included the author's translation rights, which were protected for a period of ten years from the original publication of a work. These treaties were of short duration only and expired after three to five years. Tsarist Russia even planned to join the Berne Convention
Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, is an international agreement governing copyright, which was first accepted in Berne, Switzerland in 1886.- Content :...
in the early 20th century, but that was, according to Stoyanovitch, prevented by the outbreak of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
USSR
- See also Accession of the USSR to the UCC in 1973
After the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
, the Soviet Union initially had no international copyright relations at all. During the period of the New Economic Policy
New Economic Policy
The New Economic Policy was an economic policy proposed by Vladimir Lenin, who called it state capitalism. Allowing some private ventures, the NEP allowed small animal businesses or smoke shops, for instance, to reopen for private profit while the state continued to control banks, foreign trade,...
(NEP), the Soviet regime unsuccessfully tried to conclude new bilateral copyright treaties with Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
, Germany, and Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. After these failed attempts, the USSR maintained an isolationist policy in copyright matters until the late 1960s. A first bilateral copyright treaty with Hungary became effective on November 17, 1967, and on October 8, 1971, a second treaty with Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
followed. Both treaties provided for reciprocal copyright protection with a general term of 15 years p.m.a. and also explicitly defined reciprocity for free uses.
On February 27, 1973, the Soviet Union deposited with the UNESCO
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
its declaration of accession to the Geneva version of 1952 of the Universal Copyright Convention
Universal Copyright Convention
The Universal Copyright Convention , adopted at Geneva in 1952, is one of the two principal international conventions protecting copyright; the other is the Berne Convention....
(UCC). Three months later, on May 27, 1973, the UCC entered in force with respect to the USSR, establishing copyright relations with Western countries. The USSR timed its accession to the UCC to occur before the 1971 Paris version of the UCC entered in force. Once the Paris version had become effective, accessions to the earlier Geneva version were no longer possible. The USSR would then have been forced to implement the somewhat stronger provisions of the 1971 Paris version, which in particular explicitly recognized an author's exclusive rights to reproduction, performance, and broadcast of a work. Such neighbouring rights did not exist in Soviet law.
With the accession of the Soviet Union to the UCC, Soviet works published on or after May 27, 1973 became eligible to copyright in all other signatory countries of the UCC. Conversely, foreign works became copyrighted in the Soviet Union by virtue of the UCC if they were published on or after May 27, 1973 and the publication occurred in a UCC country or the author was a citizen of a UCC country.
There were initially fears in the West that the Soviet authorities could misuse the provisions of the UCC to censor undesirable works abroad: the regime could compulsorily purchase the copyright on such works without the authors' consent and then sue in foreign courts against the publication of Soviet works abroad, since the copyright would be owned by the state. However, this did not occur. Evidently, the Soviet authorities considered the measures provided by its other laws—in particular articles 70 and 190(1) of the RSFSR Criminal Code on anti-Soviet agitation—sufficient to deal with dissident
Dissident
A dissident, broadly defined, is a person who actively challenges an established doctrine, policy, or institution. When dissidents unite for a common cause they often effect a dissident movement....
s without needing to resort to actions based on the copyright law. Furthermore, such actions would have badly damaged the prestige of the USSR abroad, and it was doubtful whether foreign countries would have honored such nationalizations. The U.S. included in its Copyright law of 1976 an article 201(e) that explicitly invalidated all involuntary transfers of copyright. This provision was included in the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976
Copyright Act of 1976
The Copyright Act of 1976 is a United States copyright law and remains the primary basis of copyright law in the United States, as amended by several later enacted copyright provisions...
precisely to prevent attempts of the Soviet government to employ the UCC to censor dissidents' works in the U.S.—although no such attempts had occurred yet and didn't occur afterwards.
Despite having joined the UCC, the Soviet Union continued its policy of bilateral agreements. New treaties with the German Democratic Republic
German Democratic Republic
The German Democratic Republic , informally called East Germany by West Germany and other countries, was a socialist state established in 1949 in the Soviet zone of occupied Germany, including East Berlin of the Allied-occupied capital city...
(effective November 21, 1973), Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
(October 4, 1974), and Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
(March 18, 1975) were concluded. The 1967 treaty with Hungary had already been prolonged in 1971 and was again renewed in 1977, the treaty with Bulgaria was renewed in 1975. The treaties with Hungary and Czechoslovakia also included a provision for the protection of the moral rights "without limitation in time". In 1981, the first bilateral treaty with a Western country was signed: the copyright treaty with Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
entered in force on December 16, 1981. On May 30, 1985, a treaty with Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
followed, and in 1986 the second treaty with a Western country was concluded with Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
. All these post-UCC treaties went beyond the provisions of the UCC because they were applied retroactively and explicitly applied also to works published before the USSR had joined the UCC and that were still copyrighted in their source country in 1973. (The treaty with Austria was amended to cover such pre-1973 works in 1989.) On April 19, 1989, another copyright treaty with Madagascar
Madagascar
The Republic of Madagascar is an island country located in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa...
was concluded. The treaty with the German Democratic Republic was rescinded by the USSR on June 2, 1991, following confusions about its continued applicability after the German reunification
German reunification
German reunification was the process in 1990 in which the German Democratic Republic joined the Federal Republic of Germany , and when Berlin reunited into a single city, as provided by its then Grundgesetz constitution Article 23. The start of this process is commonly referred by Germans as die...
.
On October 20, 1988, the USSR acceded to the Brussels Convention about measures against the unauthorized (re-)distribution of satellite transmissions. The treaty became effective for Russia from January 20, 1989 on. Also in 1989, the Soviet government announced its intention to join the Berne Convention, but the USSR was dissolved before that plan could be realized.
The changing economy in the Soviet Union led to the conclusion of a trade treaty between the USSR and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, signed by presidents Gorbachev and Bush
George H. W. Bush
George Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
on June 1, 1990. In this treaty, the U.S. imposed a number of measures in the field of intellectual property in exchange for granting the USSR most-favoured-nation
Most favoured nation
In international economic relations and international politics, most favoured nation is a status or level of treatment accorded by one state to another in international trade. The term means the country which is the recipient of this treatment must, nominally, receive equal trade advantages as the...
status. The treaty obliged the USSR to accede to the Berne Convention and to implement in its law a neighbouring rights scheme similar to what the Rome Convention laid down. The USSR agreed in the treaty to take substantive steps to amend its legislation in that sense by 1991. The treaty was ratified by the U.S. on December 23, 1991. The Soviet side no longer could do so, but the Russian Federation did so on June 12, 1992.
Russian Federation
When the Soviet Union was dissolved, Russia as the largest successor state adopted all international obligations of the former USSR, including its membership to the UCC. Consequently, Russia was henceforth considered a member of the UCC (in the 1952 Geneva text) since the date of the adherence of the USSR to that treaty, i.e., since May 27, 1973. The membership of the USSR in the Brussels Convention was equally continued by the Russian Federation as from December 25, 1991.On June 25, 1993, Russia and Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...
signed a treaty on the mutual protection of copyrights. To clarify the copyright situation amongst the states that had made up the former Soviet Union, the Commonwealth of Independent States
Commonwealth of Independent States
The Commonwealth of Independent States is a regional organization whose participating countries are former Soviet Republics, formed during the breakup of the Soviet Union....
(CIS) nations agreed on a cooperation agreement in the field of copyrights on September 24, 1993. This "Moscow agreement" declared that all signatory countries considered themselves bound by the UCC as of the date the USSR had joined and would confirm this state with the UNESCO
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
, which administered the UCC. The treaty also defined that the treaty states would apply the UCC amongst themselves, also for works published before May 27, 1973 if those works had been copyrighted before this date according to the national laws of the successor states. This provision was subject to the rule of the shorter term
Rule of the shorter term
The rule of the shorter term, also called the comparison of terms, is a provision in international copyright treaties. The provision allows that signatory countries can limit the duration of copyright they grant to foreign works under national treatment, to at most the copyright term granted in the...
. The intent of the Moscow agreement was to avoid that older Soviet works became copyrighted in only some of the successor states, but would become part of the public domain in some of the others. The 1993 Moscow agreement entered in force in Russia on May 6, 1995.
During the same year, Russia and Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
concluded a trade agreement in which they granted each other most-favoured-nation status concerning intellectual property rights, i.e., they agreed to grant the other treaty partner automatically and without conditions any trade advantage they'd grant a third country. This treaty entered in force on July 1, 1995. In a comprehensive trade treaty with the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
that was signed on June 24, 1994, Russia granted this most-favoured-nation status also to the EU member countries, excepting only trade advantages granted amongst the successor states of the USSR and also those Russia would grant a third country on an effective reciprocal basis. Because the ratification of this treaty was delayed as it had to be ratified by all EU members, an interim agreement containing only the provisions on intellectual property and the most-favoured-nation status was signed on July 17, 1995. It entered in force on February 1, 1996.
On November 3, 1994, the Russian government announced that the country would join three international treaties in the field of copyrights: the 1971 Paris version of the UCC including its annexes, the Geneva Phonograms Convention on unauthorized duplication and parallel import
Parallel import
A parallel import is a non-counterfeit product imported from another country without the permission of the intellectual property owner. Parallel imports are often referred to as grey product, and are implicated in issues of international trade, and intellectual property.The practice of parallel...
of phonograms, and the Berne Convention. The accession documents to all three treaties were deposited on December 9, 1994. The UCC (Paris 1971 version) became effective for Russia on March 9, 1995. The Geneva Convention entered in force with respect to Russia on March 13, 1995 and was not retroactive: it covered only phonograms recorded after that date.
Berne Convention
The Berne Convention also became effective for Russia on March 13, 1995. The Berne Convention is retroactive in principle: according to its article 18, it applies to all works that are copyrighted in their source country (the country where the first publication of the work occurred) on the day the treaty enters in force with respect to a joining country such as Russia. Article 18(2) adds that if "through the expiry of the term of protection which was previously granted, a work has fallen into the public domain of the country where protection is claimed, that work shall not be protected anew." Hence works that were copyrighted in Russia on March 13, 1995 became copyrighted in all other Berne Countries on that date. Under these provisions, foreign works not formerly copyrighted in Russia should also have become copyrighted in Russia. Russian legal scholars had warned of this, and the government feared the impacts on the trade balance with Western countries if Russian publishers would suddenly have to pay royalties for foreign works. In its declaration of accession, Russia therefore made a reservation regarding article 18 of the Berne Convention, stating that the treaty "shall not extend to the works which, at the date of entry into force of the said Convention in respect of the Russian Federation, are already in the public domain in its territory." For Russian and Soviet work that originated in Russia, this was just a restatement of article 18(1) of the Berne Convention; but as far as foreign works were concerned, this reservation effectively denied the retroactivity of the Berne Convention within Russia. This was of some importance because of the issue of foreign works published before May 27, 1973, when the USSR had joined the UCC. Such works had never been eligible to copyright in the Soviet Union or in Russia. Under §18(2) of the Berne Convention, they should have become copyrighted in 1995 because that article only exempted works that once were copyrighted, but on which that copyright already had expired, which didn't apply to pre-1973 foreign works in Russia. The reservation made by Russia used a slightly different phrasing, just stating that works that were in the public domainPublic domain
Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...
in Russia in 1995 would not be reprotected. As pre-1973 foreign works were not copyrighted at all and thus in the public domain in Russia in 1995, such works remained in the public domain in Russia. Russia thus got rather favorable conditions when it joined Berne Convention: Russian and Soviet works became copyrighted retroactively in other Berne countries, but pre-1973 works from those other countries did not become copyrighted in Russia.
This Russian interpretation was heavily criticized by Western countries and in particular by the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. Russian scholars, however, repeatedly (and, in the opinion of Elst, rightly) pointed out that there had been a very prominent precedent: in 1989, when the U.S. had joined the Berne Convention, they also had denied the retroactivity of the treaty. From 1989 until 1995, the U.S. only respected the copyrights under the Berne Convention on foreign works from another country that were published on or after the later of that country's adherence date to the Berne Convention and March 1, 1989 (the adherence date of U.S.), and on foreign works from a UCC country according to the provisions of the UCC, which meant on works that were published after the later of September 16, 1955 (the date the UCC entered in force for the U.S. and the other initial signatories) and the adherence date of the foreign UCC country. In the case of Russian or Soviet works, this meant that until 1996, the U.S. continued to recognize only copyrights on Soviet works published after May 27, 1973. The U.S. faced harsh critique for its unilateral denouncement of the retroactivity of the Berne Convention defined in article 18(1) BC. Ultimately, the U.S. had to reverse its position on that issue. It implemented the TRIPS agreement (a precondition to becoming a WTO
World Trade Organization
The World Trade Organization is an organization that intends to supervise and liberalize international trade. The organization officially commenced on January 1, 1995 under the Marrakech Agreement, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade , which commenced in 1948...
member) in its Uruguay Round Agreements Act
Uruguay Round Agreements Act
The Uruguay Round Agreements Act was an Act of Congress in the United States that implemented in U.S. law the provisions agreed upon at the Uruguay Round of negotiations of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade .- Legislative history :U.S...
(URAA), which was signed into law on December 8, 1994. The URAA effectively restored the copyright in the U.S. on foreign works on January 1, 1996, if those works were until then not copyrighted in the U.S. because of a failure to meet the U.S. formalities (such as not bearing a copyright notice, or lacking registration with the U.S. Copyright Office) or because of a lack of international treaties between the U.S. and the source country of the work, if the work was still copyrighted in its source country on January 1, 1996.
Russian scholars have disputed this retroactivity issue at length. Gavrilov, for instance, who had argued for the Russian reservation to the Berne Convention, kept defending it, while others disagreed. Maggs and Sergeyev, for instance, pointed out in 2000 that the reservation was inadmissible under article 30(1) of the Berne Convention; Podshibikhin and Leontiev agreed in 2002. The modification of the copyright law through law 72-FL in 2004 refuelled the discussion, because this law added a new paragraph 4 to article 5 of the 1993 copyright law which clearly stated under which conditions foreign works were copyrighted in Russia, using a wording that corresponded in essence to articles 18(1) and 18(2) of the Berne Convention. Nevertheless, Gavrilov continued arguing in favour of the non-protection of pre-1973 foreign works, arguing that this was not so much a reservation to the Berne Convention but merely an interpretation, whereas others considered the 2004 amendments to finally do away with this reservation and claimed that law 72-FL restored copyright in Russia on pre-1973 foreign works. According to the Russian representative at the negotiations on Russia's accession to the WTO, law 72-FL indeed was intended to rescind the non-retroactivity reservation, thereby restoring copyrights on pre-1973 foreign works. The Russian copyright law (already before 2004) also considered international treaties self-executing and to take precedence over the Russian law (article 3). The common practice in Russia nevertheless did not change; pre-1973 foreign works were commonly considered to be uncopyrighted in Russia due to this reservation.
Other treaties
In 2003, Russia also joined the Rome ConventionRome Convention
The Rome Convention may refer to one of the following conventions:* Rome Convention of 1980 on contractual obligations* Rome Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organisations...
, the analogue of the Berne Convention for neighbouring rights. The adherence of Russia to the Rome Convention became effective on May 26, 2003. The Rome convention covered performances, phonograms, and broadcasts. For phonograms, it stipulated that phonograms produced by a national of a contracting state, or fixated in a contracting state, or published in a contracting state were covered, but allowed signatory countries to choose among the latter two (article 5). Russia chose to apply the criteria of nationality and publication, declaring the criterion of fixation as inapplicable in its adherence to the treaty. The Rome Convention is non-retroactive and applies only to phonograms created after and to performances or broadcasts that occurred after a country jointed the convention (article 20).
Until 2006, Russia had joined neither the WIPO Copyright Treaty nor the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty
WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty
The WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty is an international treaty signed by the member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization was adopted in Geneva on December 20, 1996...
. Its application to enter General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade was negotiated during the UN Conference on Trade and Employment and was the outcome of the failure of negotiating governments to create the International Trade Organization . GATT was signed in 1947 and lasted until 1993, when it was replaced by the World...
(GATT) and to become a World Trade Organization
World Trade Organization
The World Trade Organization is an organization that intends to supervise and liberalize international trade. The organization officially commenced on January 1, 1995 under the Marrakech Agreement, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade , which commenced in 1948...
(WTO) member was postponed in 2001; negotiations were still ongoing in 2006. If and when Russia should become a WTO member, it would need to rescind its non-retroactivity reservation regarding the Berne Convention. Indeed Russia agreed in November 2006 to ensure that its new intellectual property legislation in part IV of the Civil Code, which was scheduled to enter in force on January 1, 2008, was fully TRIPS compliant.
International copyright
The international copyright relations of the Soviet Union and of Russia gave rise to copyright on Soviet works abroad and also to some foreign works becoming copyrighted in the USSR or in Russia. In some cases, Soviet works even became copyrighted in other countries in the absence of any international copyright treaties.Copyright on foreign works in the USSR and in Russia
Prior to the accession of the Soviet Union to the UCC, only works by foreign authors that were first published in the USSR and unpublished works of foreign authors that existed in an objective form on the territory of the USSR were eligible to copyright. When the USSR joined the UCC in 1973 and the treaty entered in force with respect to the USSR on May 27, 1973, foreign works first published on or after that date outside of the USSR became copyrighted in the Soviet Union if- the author was a national of any other signatory country of the UCC, irrespective of where this publication occurred, or if
- the work was first published in any other UCC country, regardless of the nationality of the author.
In addition to the UCC, the bilateral treaties the USSR concluded with several countries, amongst them also two Western countries, made works of nationals of these countries eligible for copyright in the Soviet Union, even works published before May 27, 1973. In the case of Austria, Poland, and Sweden, this even applied to any work first published there, irrespective of the nationality of the author.
Since its accession to the Berne Convention in 1995, the following foreign works were copyrighted in Russia:
- Soviet works published in the Russian SFSR, as well as works of authors who became citizens of the Russian federation after the demise of the USSR became subject to the copyright law of the Russian Federation of 1993 (and its amendments) due to the strict territoriality of copyright law.
- Soviet works that were first published in one of the other fourteen republics of the USSR and created by authors who did not become nationals of the Russian Federation were subject to the Russian copyright law per the Moscow agreement.
- Works by nationals of countries that adhered to the Berne Convention, but not to the UCC, or works published in such a country, became eligible to copyright in Russia if they were published on or after March 13, 1995, the date the Berne Convention became effective with respect to Russia.
- Works of nationals of UCC countries, or works first published in such a country (regardless of the author's nationality), were subject to copyright in Russia if the works were first published on or after May 27, 1973. Because of the Russian reservation concerning the retroactivity of the Berne Convention, this applied whether or not the UCC country had also signed the Berne Convention.
- Pre-1973 works of nationals of one of the countries the USSR or Russia concluded bilateral treaties with were subject to copyright in Russia insofar as these treaties remained effective. This concerned works of nationals of Austria, Armenia, Bulgaria, Cuba, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Madagascar, Poland, Slovakia, and Sweden, regardless of the place of first publication. It also applied generally to works first published in Austria, Poland, or Sweden, regardless of the author's nationality, as the bilateral treaties with these states explicitly stated so.
Copyright on Soviet and Russian works in other countries
Even before the accession of the Soviet Union to the UCC in 1973, some Soviet works were copyrighted in some other countries. One well-known case concerned the actions of the four Soviet composers Shostakovich, KhachaturianAram Khachaturian
Aram Ilyich Khachaturian was a prominent Soviet composer. Khachaturian's works were often influenced by classical Russian music and Armenian folk music...
, Prokofiev
Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
, and Myaskovsky
Nikolai Myaskovsky
Nikolai Yakovlevich Myaskovsky was a Russian and Soviet composer. He is sometimes referred to as the "father of the Soviet symphony".-Early years and first important works:...
against the movie company 20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...
. 20th Century Fox had published a movie called The Iron Curtain, using music of these four composers as background music and crediting the composers. The four Soviet composers initiated legal actions against the movie company, claiming that the use of their names and music in a movie whose theme was objectionable to them and that was unsympathetic to the Soviet ideology libeled them and violated their civil rights. In the U.S., the courts dismissed these claims in Shostakovich v. Twentieth Century-Fox
Shostakovich v. Twentieth Century-Fox
Shostakovich v. Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp., 80 N.Y.S.2d 575 , aff'd, 87 N.Y.S.2d 430 , was a copyright lawsuit...
(80 N.Y.S.2d 575
Case citation
Case citation is the system used in many countries to identify the decisions in past court cases, either in special series of books called reporters or law reports, or in a 'neutral' form which will identify a decision wherever it was reported...
(N.Y. Sup. Ct. 1948), affirmed, 87 N.Y.S.2d 430 (N.Y. App. Div. 1949)), in particular because the works of these composers were in the public domain in the U.S. at that time because there were no international treaties relating to copyright between the U.S. and the USSR. The compositions themselves also had not been distorted, so the court found that the composers' moral right to the integrity of the work was not violated.
The four plaintiffs also went to court over this issue in France. Up to 1964, the French legislation treated both French authors and foreign authors exactly the same; works of both were granted exactly the same copyright protection. In a law suit that was ultimately decided by the French Court of Cassation
Court of Cassation (France)
The French Supreme Court of Judicature is France's court of last resort having jurisdiction over all matters triable in the judicial stream but only scope of review to determine a miscarriage of justice or certify a question of law based solely on points of law...
in 1959, the plaintiff
Plaintiff
A plaintiff , also known as a claimant or complainant, is the term used in some jurisdictions for the party who initiates a lawsuit before a court...
s won: the court ruled that works of foreign authors were entitled to copyright in France, and that the works of these four Soviet composers were thus copyrighted in France. It found their moral rights violated and ordered the film to be confiscated.
Another way by which Soviet works could become copyrighted outside of the Soviet Union was the smuggling of manuscripts out of the USSR to have the work first published abroad. This practice, known as tamizdat
Samizdat
Samizdat was a key form of dissident activity across the Soviet bloc in which individuals reproduced censored publications by hand and passed the documents from reader to reader...
in the Soviet Union, could result in serious repercussions for the authors in the USSR, but was still employed as one of the few ways the governmental censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
could be bypassed. As a side effect, tamizdat works were granted copyright in the foreign country of first publication. If that country was a signatory of the UCC or the Berne Convention, the work was also granted copyright in all other signatories of these treaties, because they both extended copyright to works of citizens of non-member states, if these works were first published in a member state. A very famous case of a tamizdat publication was Boris Pasternak
Boris Pasternak
Boris Leonidovich Pasternak was a Russian language poet, novelist, and literary translator. In his native Russia, Pasternak's anthology My Sister Life, is one of the most influential collections ever published in the Russian language...
's novel Doctor Zhivago
Doctor Zhivago
-Original creation:*Doctor Zhivago, by Boris Pasternak, published in 1957**Yuri Andreyevich Zhivago, a fictional character and the main protagonist of the book Doctor Zhivago-Adaptations:There are several adaptations based on the Doctor Zhivago book:...
, which, after it had been refused by Soviet publishers, was first published in an Italian translation in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
in 1957. Because Italy was a member of both the UCC and the Berne Convention, the work was entitled to full copyright in all other member states of these two conventions. Pasternak was expelled from the Writers' Union
USSR Union of Writers
The USSR Union of Writers, or Union of Soviet Writers was a creative union of professional writers in the USSR. It was founded in 1932 on the initiative of the Central Committee of the Communist Party after disbanding a number of other writers' organizations: RAPP, Proletkult, and VOAPP.The aim of...
and, after he had been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature
Nobel Prize in Literature
Since 1901, the Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded annually to an author from any country who has, in the words from the will of Alfred Nobel, produced "in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction"...
in 1958, forced to decline acceptance of the award.
Early Soviet authors sometimes benefited from international copyright on their works just naturally. Maxim Gorky
Maxim Gorky
Alexei Maximovich Peshkov , primarily known as Maxim Gorky , was a Russian and Soviet author, a founder of the Socialist Realism literary method and a political activist.-Early years:...
and Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
, for instance, both had lived for some time abroad and published works in other countries that were members of the Berne Convention. These works of theirs were copyrighted in all other signatory countries of the Berne Convention. After the case of Doctor Zhivago, Soviet publishers became more aware of this possibility to have Soviet works covered by the Berne Convention. Soviet state organizations began to arrange for (simultaneous) first publication of some Soviet works in a country of the Berne Convention. For instance, Mikhail Sholokov's novel They Fought for Their Country was officially first published in Italy.
When the Soviet Union joined to the UCC, all Soviet works published on or after May 27, 1973 became eligible to copyright in all other signatory countries of the UCC. This state persisted until the dissolution of the USSR. When the USSR disintegrated, so did its copyright law. The split into fifteen independent states translated into a split into fifteen independent copyright laws, each with its own jurisdiction defined by the territory of the new successor state of the Soviet Union. Through the Moscow agreement, Soviet works first published in the RSFSR, which were thus subject to the Russian law, became eligible for copyright is all other CIS nations, even if they had been published before 1973.
Since its accession to the Berne Convention in 1995, the following Russian and Soviet works were copyrighted outside of Russia:
- All works copyrighted in Russia in 1995, when Russia joined the Berne Convention, became copyrighted in other Berne countries. By virtue of the retroactivity of the Russian copyright law of 1993, this also included many pre-1973 Soviet works, namely all works published in 1945 or later and also older works of authors who died or were rehabilitated in 1945 or later (or 1941 for authors who lived during the Great Patriotic War), if these works were first published in the Russian SFSR (or later in Russia) or the author had become a citizen of the Russian Federation after the demise of the Soviet Union.
- All works copyrighted in Russia on January 1, 1996, the effective date of the U.S. Uruguay Round Agreements Act, became copyrighted in the U.S. on that date. This essentially concerned all the same works as above, but using the years 1946 or 1942 instead of 1945 and 1941, respectively.
- In the countries that had bilateral treaties with the USSR, pre-1973 Soviet works (from any of the fifteen SSRs) were copyrighted even before.
External links
- Chapter IV of the 1964 Civil Code of the RSFSR, in a post-1973 edition (with the 25 years p.m.a. term): the Soviet copyright law in Russian.
- Chapter IV of the 1991 Fundamentals, in Russian.
- English translation of the Russian Law on Copyright and Neighbouring Rights of 1993, with amendments up to 2004.
- ROSPATENT – Russian Federal Service for Intellectual Property, Patents, and Trademarks.
- CIPR – Coalition for Intellectual Property Rights.
- http://www.copyright.ru/