Stephan Kinsella
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
intellectual property
Intellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
lawyer
Lawyer
A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...
and libertarian legal theorist
Libertarian theories of law
Libertarian theories of law build upon classical liberal and individualist anarchist doctrines.The defining characteristics of libertarian legal theory are its insistence that the amount of government intervention should be kept to a minimum and the primary functions of law should be enforcement of...
. His electronically published works are primarily published on his blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
and websites associated with the Ludwig von Mises Institute
Ludwig von Mises Institute
The Ludwig von Mises Institute , based in Auburn, Alabama, is a libertarian academic organization engaged in research and scholarship in the fields of economics, philosophy and political economy. Its scholarship is inspired by the work of Austrian School economist Ludwig von Mises...
and anarcho-capitalist organizations.
Education
Born in PrairievillePrairieville, Louisiana
Prairieville is an unincorporated community in Ascension Parish, Louisiana, United States. It is south of Baton Rouge and north of Gonzales, Louisiana. The latitude of is 30.302N. The longitude is -90.971W. Elevation is ....
, Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
, he attended Louisiana State University
Louisiana State University
Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, most often referred to as Louisiana State University, or LSU, is a public coeducational university located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The University was founded in 1853 in what is now known as Pineville, Louisiana, under the name...
where he earned Bachelor of Science
Bachelor of Science
A Bachelor of Science is an undergraduate academic degree awarded for completed courses that generally last three to five years .-Australia:In Australia, the BSc is a 3 year degree, offered from 1st year on...
(BS) and Master of Science
Master of Science
A Master of Science is a postgraduate academic master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is typically studied for in the sciences including the social sciences.-Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay:...
(MS) degrees in electrical engineering, and a Juris Doctor
Juris Doctor
Juris Doctor is a professional doctorate and first professional graduate degree in law.The degree was first awarded by Harvard University in the United States in the late 19th century and was created as a modern version of the old European doctor of law degree Juris Doctor (see etymology and...
(JD) from the Paul M. Hebert Law Center
Paul M. Hebert Law Center
The Paul M. Hebert Law Center is a law school in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, part of the Louisiana State University System and located on the main campus of Louisiana State University....
. He also obtained an LL.M.
Master of Laws
The Master of Laws is an advanced academic degree, pursued by those holding a professional law degree, and is commonly abbreviated LL.M. from its Latin name, Legum Magister. The University of Oxford names its taught masters of laws B.C.L...
at the University of London
University of London
-20th century:Shortly after 6 Burlington Gardens was vacated, the University went through a period of rapid expansion. Bedford College, Royal Holloway and the London School of Economics all joined in 1900, Regent's Park College, which had affiliated in 1841 became an official divinity school of the...
.
Career in law
Kinsella is general counsel of Applied Optoelectronics, Inc. of Sugar Land, TexasSugar Land, Texas
Sugar Land is a city in the U.S. state of Texas within the metropolitan area and Fort Bend County. Sugar Land is one of the most affluent and fastest-growing cities in Texas, having grown more than 158 percent in the last decade. In the time period of 2000–2007, Sugar Land also enjoyed a...
. A practicing intellectual property attorney and former adjunct professor of law at South Texas College of Law
South Texas College of Law
South Texas College of Law is a private American Bar Association accredited law school and is a member of the Association of American Law Schools...
, where he taught computer law, Kinsella is actively involved with libertarian legal and political theory, and is an adjunct scholar of the Mises Institute as well as the former Book Review Editor for the Institute's Journal of Libertarian Studies
Journal of Libertarian Studies
The Journal of Libertarian Studies is a scholarly journal published annually by the Ludwig von Mises Institute and Lew Rockwell. It was established in the spring of 1977 by Murray Rothbard who also served as its editor until his death in 1995...
. He is also a contributor to the news and opinion blog at LewRockwell.com
LewRockwell.com
LewRockwell.com is a 501 libertarian web magazine operated by Burton Blumert , Lew Rockwell , Eric Garris , and others associated with the Center for Libertarian Studies ; its motto is "anti-state, anti-war, pro-market"...
and is the creator of Libertarian Papers, a peer-reviewed online journal published under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License
Creative Commons licenses
Creative Commons licenses are several copyright licenses that allow the distribution of copyrighted works. The licenses differ by several combinations that condition the terms of distribution. They were initially released on December 16, 2002 by Creative Commons, a U.S...
.
He writes that, after college, he "began to put more emphasis on Austrian economics and paleolibertarian insights of Rothbard, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, and Rockwell."
Publications
Kinsella's legal publications include books and articles about patentPatent
A patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention....
law, contract law, e-commerce law, international law
International law
Public international law concerns the structure and conduct of sovereign states; analogous entities, such as the Holy See; and intergovernmental organizations. To a lesser degree, international law also may affect multinational corporations and individuals, an impact increasingly evolving beyond...
and other topics. Kinsella has also published and lectured on a variety of libertarian topics, often combining libertarian and legal analysis. Kinsella's views on contract theory, causation and the law, intellectual property
Intellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
, and rights theory (in particular his estoppel
Estoppel
Estoppel in its broadest sense is a legal term referring to a series of legal and equitable doctrines that preclude "a person from denying or asserting anything to the contrary of that which has, in contemplation of law, been established as the truth, either by the acts of judicial or legislative...
theory) are his main contributions to libertarian theory.
In contract theory, he extends Murray Rothbard
Murray Rothbard
Murray Newton Rothbard was an American author and economist of the Austrian School who helped define capitalist libertarianism and popularized a form of free-market anarchism he termed "anarcho-capitalism." Rothbard wrote over twenty books and is considered a centrally important figure in the...
's and Williamson Evers
Williamson Evers
Williamson M. "Bill" Evers is an American political activist and education researcher. In 1988, he became a resident scholar at Stanford University's Hoover Institution -- first as a national fellow, then a visiting scholar, and most recently a research fellow...
's title transfer theory of contract linking it with inalienability theory while also attempting to clarify that theory. Kinsella advances a theory of causation that attempts to explain why remote actors can be liable under libertarian theory. He gives non-utilitarian arguments for intellectual property being incompatible with libertarian property rights principles. He offers a discourse ethics
Discourse ethics
Discourse ethics, sometimes called argumentation ethics, refers to a type of argument that attempts to establish normative or ethical truths by examining the presuppositions of discourse.-Habermas and Apel:...
argument for the justification of individual rights, using an extension of the concept of estoppel
Estoppel
Estoppel in its broadest sense is a legal term referring to a series of legal and equitable doctrines that preclude "a person from denying or asserting anything to the contrary of that which has, in contemplation of law, been established as the truth, either by the acts of judicial or legislative...
.
Books
- Protecting Foreign Investment Under International Law: Legal Aspects of Political Risk (with Paul E. Comeaux). Oceana Publications, 1997. ISBN 978-0379213713
- Online Contract Formation (with Andrew Simpson). Oxford University Press, 2004. ISBN 978-0379215199
- International Investment, Political Risk, and Dispute Resolution: A Practitioner's Guide (with Noah Rubins). Oxford University Press, 2005. ISBN 978-0379215229
- Against Intellectual Property. Ludwig von Mises Institute, 2008. ISBN 978-1933550329
External links
- KinsellaLaw, Stephan Kinsella's legal website
- StephanKinsella.com, Stephan Kinsella's libertarian website
- List of publications
- Archive of Kinsella commentary from LewRockwell.comLewRockwell.comLewRockwell.com is a 501 libertarian web magazine operated by Burton Blumert , Lew Rockwell , Eric Garris , and others associated with the Center for Libertarian Studies ; its motto is "anti-state, anti-war, pro-market"...
- Symposium: "Do patents and copyrights undermine private property?" Ilana MercerIlana MercerIlana Mercer is a writer, born in South Africa to Rabbi Ben Isaacson and raised in Israel, where the family decided to move after Rabbi Ben Isaacson's anti-apartheid preaching and activism led to their harassment by South African security forces...
, Stephan Kinsella, and James DeLong. Insight on the News. 21 May 2001.