Institute for Globalization and International Regulation

IGIR’s intellectual property research group is a uniquely deep and broad group of multidisciplinary researchers working on intellectual property, innovation and knowledge management. The group has a particularly strong expertise in the field of international, European and comparative intellectual property research and analysis. The composition of the group allows for a wide geographical and linguistic research scope, enabling its researchers to excel at contrasting and comparing rationales, examining implementations of different forms of IP, and conducting evaluations of the goals and effectiveness of innovation and IP policy. The group has extensive experience in assessing the European Union’s intellectual property policy and its impact on the EU legal order, the external sphere and the national systems of the Member States. The staff have researched EU policies and authored studies on pharmaceutical patents, biotechnology patents, trade secrets, IP enforcement (ACTA), industrial designs, competition and standards, and copyright.

IGIR’s international trade and investment research group focuses on the challenges posed by the limiting effect of international rules regarding trade liberalisation and investment protection on the sovereign autonomy of states to pursue important societal objectives. Not only the substantive obligations contained in the international trade and investment regimes but also the institutional arrangements through which these obligations are developed and enforced can have significant implications for the regulatory autonomy of States. Societal concern on these issues is evident from the intense public debate on the mega-regional trade and investment agreements recently concluded or currently being negotiated, such as the Canada - EU Trade Agreement (CETA) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) between the European Union and the United States, which aim at an unprecedented level of economic integration and regulatory coordination. The group is well placed to examine the increasing interaction between the international trade and investment regimes, and to benefit from opportunities to develop new insights arising from this interaction.