I’ve noted before that the term “human rights” and, in particular, its usage in

international law, has acquired a leftist, anti-property tinge–incompatible with the

Rothbardian-libertarian conception of human rights as property rights. (See my Book
Review of Patrick Burke, No Harm: Ethical Principles for a Free
Market (1994), Reason Papers No. 20 (Fall 1995), at n. 13 and accompanying text;
Murray N. Rothbard, “Human Rights” As Property Rights, in The Ethics of Liberty.)

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights [sic] is a veritable socialistic manifesto,

providing for “rights” to social security (Art. 22); to protection against unemployment,
equal pay for equal work, and to unionize (Art. 23); to vacation time (Art. 24); to food,
housing, and medical care (Art. 25); and to an education (Art. 26). The International
Covenants on Human Rights include the International Covenant on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights, which provides for similar welfare rights. They also make it clear
that property rights and other rights are subject to the state’s pleasure: Art. 17
(“Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others …
No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property”); Art. 29(2) (“In the exercise of his
rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are
determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the
rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public
order and the general welfare in a democratic society”).

So it should be no surprise that according to article 27(2) of the Universal Declaration

of Human Rights, “Everyone 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.” Internationalist socialists think IP is a right. Damned by faint praise!

Conflicts do not arise over intellectual property. Conflicts arise over physical property. For
example, I am the first one who makes a BLT (bacon lettuce tomato sandwich). You see my BLT
and create the idea of the BLT in your mind. At that point in time, the idea of the BLT exists in
two minds. While only one of us can fully access the physical BLT, we can each fully access the
idea of the BLT.

Let’s say you access your idea of the BLT and make a physical BLT. I cry foul, and say you
stole my idea. There is conflict, but I am mistaken to think it is over the idea, since I still retain
my idea. The conflict is over the bacon, lettuce, tomato, and bread that you used to make your
sandwich. I am claiming that by coming up with the idea of the BLT, that you cannot use your
ingredients in that way. We are arguing over how you use your physical property.

My main point is that the implementation of intellectual property rights not only fails to serve
the purpose of minimizing conflict over scarce resources, but it actually tends to increase them,
by encouraging the violation of physical property rights.

http://blog.mises.org/14363/intellectual-property-as-socialistic-human-rights/
The Ethics of Liberty by Murray N.
Rothbard

LIBERALS GENERALLY WISH TO preserve the concept of “rights” for such

“human” rights as freedom of speech, while denying the concept to private property.1
And yet, on the contrary the concept of “rights” only makes sense as property rights.
For not only are there no human rights which are not also property rights, but the former
rights lose their absoluteness and clarity and become fuzzy and vulnerable when
property rights are not used as the standard.

     In the first place, there are two senses in which property rights are identical with
human rights: one, that property can only accrue to humans, so that their rights to
property are rights that belong to human beings; and two, that the person’s right to his
own body, his personal liberty,, is a property right in his own person as well as a
“human right.” But more importantly for our discussion, human rights, when not put in
terms of property rights, turn out to be vague and contradictory, causing liberals to
weaken those rights on behalf of “public policy” or the “public good.”