Copyright law and Accessibility for People with Disabilities

From the Viewpoint of Social Inclusion

Abstract

This paper addresses the relation between disabilities and copyright law. We propose institutional design considering social inclusion in order to ensure better information accessibility so that disabled people use copyrighted works. First, this paper surveys outline of the Marrakesh Treaty and clarifies the current situation and problems of Japanese Copyright Law. Second, since disabilities are caused by interactions between dysfunctions and social barriers, from the viewpoint of securing accessibility, it is necessary to aim for elimination of social barriers in the design of institutions of rights limitations or exceptions of copyrights. From this point of view, in order to realize " social inclusion ", the copyright law also needs flexible system design such as examining general and inclusive articles to limit copyrights for the welfare of persons with disabilities.