PLAYING WITH FIRE OR SETTING ORDER? PROTECTION AND PROMOTION OF CULTURAL IDENTITIES TROUGH INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY.

Creating a brand is not an easy task nowadays because generating identities for product or services requires time, money and creative thinking. When it comes to countries regions or places the task is even harder but not because of the number of players that present similar offers but because these identities are based on cultural aspects that reflect from inside out, meaning - they must represent the community but also mean something to the outside world. An important subject developed in the broad subject of Intellectual property is the protection of traditional knowledge, or how a local community or a country can protect cultural and spiritual aspects and the way they can promote it through intellectual property aspects such as trademarks, geographical indications, patents, copyright and related rights. But this protection can raise certain conflicts between countries, because cultural aspects cannot be confined to the limit of a border. This can lead to disputes that have national interest at the core that states cannot neglect because these are elements that define the nations. Such is the case of geographical indications which have shown us in cases such as feta, Tokaj, Habanos and others, that certain elements of intellectual property have a higher meaning that a mere economic one, because they can represent the identity of a place or country. The article explores the different aspects of intellectual property involved in the process of traditional knowledge protection and tries to identify certain aspects that must be taken into consideration when undertaking the task of protecting cultural identities.