The Moral Dilemma of France's Moral Rights: The Author vs. the Public Domain

• Pages: 37-44
• Date: 01 December 2026
• Published date: 01 December 2026
• Author: Marie-Andrée Weiss
• Subject Matter: Derecho Constitucional

Published in Landslide, Volume 18, Number 2, 2026. © 2026 by the American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights

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LANDSLIDE December/January 2026

37

The Moral Dilemma of France’s Moral Rights: The Author vs.

the Public Domain

Marie-Andrée Weiss

France affords particularly strong protection to the moral rights of the author of a work protected by copy-

right (droit d’auteur). This article examines whether France’s robust moral rights regime serves only authors, or

whether it also upholds—or impedes—the public’s right to access, reinterpret, and engage with cultural works.

Are Moral Rights Human Rights?

Moral rights are enshrined in Article 27(2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which affirms that

“[e]veryone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary

or artistic production of which he is the author.”1 However, unlike human rights, moral rights are not universal or

inherent but are acquired through independent creation by a human being. Legal entities cannot have moral rights.2

Article L111-1 of the French Intellectual Property Code provides authors “an exclusive incorporeal property right

which . . . include[s] attributes of an intellectual and moral nature as well as attributes of an economic nature.”3 Note

that moral rights are mentioned first, then economic rights. While economic rights can be transferred, moral rights

cannot be transferred during the author’s lifetime. As noted by the 2019 U.S. Copyright Office report on moral rights,

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