Copyright reformed: the narrative of flexibility and its pitfalls in policy and legislative initiatives (2011–2021)

ABSTRACT This article reviews selected copyright policy and legislation at the international, regional and national levels during the period 2011–2021. It identifies a common and consistent narrative that supported reform initiatives in the surveyed jurisdictions: the modernization of copyright requires greater flexibility so that the undertaking of certain acts without authorization is not unduly restricted and a fairer balance of rights and interests may be, as a result, achieved. Through the analysis of reform initiatives in different areas of copyright and across several different jurisdictions, it is shown how the flexibility narrative has on occasion had the effect of unduly altering the preventive nature of copyright’s exclusive rights, inappropriately referring to exceptions and limitations as rights of users, overlooking relevant legal obligations and introducing undue rigidity within the system of private autonomy. It is ultimately submitted that flexibility should not be conflated with fairness. As such, policy- and law-makers should be wary of superficially framing ongoing and future reform discourse around such a narrative without considering the shortcomings that it has led and might unduly lead to.