Born to be authors: children, creativity and copyright

This article analyses the role of the child as an author and creative individual, according to the paradigm of Maria Montessori, to expand the question of whether the law provides a sufficient and just safeguard to this category of copyright authors. Montessori’s exploration of the creative freedom of children shows how irresistibly strong and indomitable their creativity is in the early years. This article submits that the early years are a most significant phase when children, in their exercise of creative authorship, are able to express the utmost freedom and originality. Accordingly, a scholarship of copyright law “of” the child and, significantly, authorship “by” the child should be at the core of a just and balanced legal system that brings together the rights and safeguards embedded within international rules and the copyright framework.