Les régimes linguistiques limités des systèmes de la propriété industrielle de l’Union européenne : injustes, mais inévitables ?

The general language regime of the European Union consists of the 24 languages of the authentic versions of the Treaties adopted in Regulation 1/1958 as the official languages and working languages of the Union?s institutions. By contrast, for reasons of practicality, the particular language regimes of the Union?s systems of industrial property limit the number of languages of procedure to three for the European patent with unitary effect, and to five for the European Union trademark and the community design. These limitations have always given rise to political controversies and have been legally disputed for being alleged violations of the principles of non-discrimination and equality of all official languages. The focus of this study is on the two judgments in which the Court of justice dismissed those actions. without going into a critique of details, the main claim of the study is that the court has failed to sufficiently examine the consequences of the differentiation of the languages that the particular regimes admit, in particular concerning the asymmetries created in favor of the large member states and of big enterprise. These asymmetries are not only detrimental to the other member states, other applicants for protection, and other economic actors, but they are also at the expense of the public interest. Ultimately, however, although a fairer design should have been developed, a certain asymmetry in the language regimes of the European Union?s systems of industrial property is unavoidable.