Moral right

The moral right is a right extrapatrimonial attached to the person of the author who tends to preserve and defend his work and his person in the relationship with the thirds which are the users of work.

With the patrimonial Right, the moral right constitutes one of the two facets of the Royalty in France. It is a specificity of the French design of the royalty who does not exist in the countries of common law .

He is defined in the article L. 121-1 of the Code of the intellectual property (hereafter CPI), which specifies that: “ the author enjoys the right to the respect of its name, its quality and its work. ”

It comprises four branches:

right of disclosure (Article 121-2 CPI): the right to communicate work with the public is decided by the author alone, under conditions which it will have chosen. However, this prerogative becomes exhausted at the time of its first exercise.
right of paternity: the author is entitled to the respect of the bond of filiation between him and his work
the right to the respect of work
the right of repentance (Article L 121-4 CPI): the author can withdraw the work of the trade-circuit, even after his disclosure.

Lastly, according to the article L 121-1 al. 2 of CPI, the moral right is perpetual, imprescriptible and inalienable. Thus, it cannot be yielded and it can be exerted by the Auteur itself, or by its having right, without time limit.

To respect the moral right of the author of a work entered the public domain, it is enough to quote the name of the author and the title of work used.

However, even if it is famous absolute by the doctrines, the moral right is limited by the practice and the Jurisprudence. Initially, at the time of a lawsuit the author will be held to prove the violation and the damage undergone to obtain repair. In the same way, a debate exists on the question of knowing if the moral right can be limited by the theory of the Abus right. According to Professor Gautier, the Court of appeal did not extend the theory of the abuse right on these questions. For example, in the Whistler stop of the March 14th 1900, Whitsler refused to deliver its work to its silent partners, but the Court did not grant distraint to them. It was satisfied to grant damages to them. It would thus not have applied the theory of the abuse right.

Lastly, the moral right has a character of law and order. It is what points out constantly jurisprudence as in the Camus stop of TGI of Paris, the February 15th 1984 where the court decides that “ since there was concession with the under-editor the author is supposed being present in any convention being able to put in danger its moral right ”. In the same way, the Rouault stop of the TGI of the Seine of the July 10th 1946 indicated that “ conventions which relate to works of the spirit leave the normal categories of the right and differ from ordinary conventions, because of the influence which on them the moral right of the author exerts”.

External bonds

Right of the culture, Management and Trades of art

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