Who sets the policy for intellectual property?

The bulk of intellectual property law is contained in federal statutes. Copyrights are protected by the Copyright Act (17 U.S.C.A. § 101 et seq. [1994]), patents are covered in the Patent Act (35 U.S.C.A. § 101 et seq. [1994]), and trademark protection is provided by the Lanham Act (also known as the Trademark Act) (15 U.S.C.A. § 1501 et seq. [1994]). Intellectual property laws give artists the exclusive right to profit from their work for a particular limited period. For copyrighted material, the exclusive right lasts for fifty years beyond the death of the author. The length of the right can vary forpatents, but in most cases it lasts for twenty years. Trademark rights are exclusive for ten years, and can be continually renewed for subsequent ten-year periods. |5|

Reference
|5| http://www.answers.com/topic/intellectual-property?method=22