Indeed. Copyright is ultimately an outgrowth of the privatization of government censorship in sixteenth-century England.

For those interested, a readable summary of the history of copyright can be found at: http://questioncopyright.org/promise

Falkvinge himself also has a multi-part history of copyright blog series, found at: http://falkvinge.net/2011/02/01/history-of-copyright-part-1-...