On The Judicialadjudication Of Trademark Invalidation Request Dispute

Trademark invalidation request dispute case is an important part of trademark confirmation dispute case,which is of great significance to trademark protection.If there is a dispute over the validity of the registered trademark right,the party may,in accordance with the provisions of Articles 44 and 45 of the Trademark Law,request the original trademark review and adjudication board for the invalidation of the trademark.The party who refuses to accept the ruling of trademark invalidation may bring an administrative lawsuit to the court.In this model,only the original Trademark Review and Adjudication Board has the power to examine the invalidation request,while the court can only examine the legality of the invalidation decision in the administrative litigation proceedings.However,with the rapid growth of the number of trademark registration applications and trademark invalidation request disputes,the disadvantages of the current model are becoming more and more prominent,such as repeated dispute settlement procedures,low efficiency,and unbalanced status of litigation subjects,etc.This model is widely criticized.The theoretical and practical circles have discussed the deficiencies of the existing model extensively and put forward their own suggestions for optimization or reform.These practical problems and their countermeasures,in essence,area round the problem of judicial adjudication of trademark invalidation request disputes,that is,whether to grant the court the final adjudication and independent adjudication of trademark invalidation request disputes.This issue is related to whether the current model can be reformed and how to reform,which is important to dispute resolution over trademark confirmation and trademark right protection in our country.This paper will conduct an in-depth analysis,focusing on the nature of the litigation against the ruling on the invalidation of trademarks and the attribution of the adjudication power of declaring trademark invalidation,and try to propose a perfect plan for the judicial adjudication of disputes over trademark invalidation requests in our country that is both theoretically feasible and can respond to actual needs.This paper is divided into the following three parts:The first chapter is an overview of the current situation of trademark invalidation request dispute settlement in our country and the analysis of the existing controversy whether the court has the right to adjudicate on the issue of disputes over the validity of trademark rights or not.On one hand,starting from the problem of determining the nature of litigation against trademark invalidation,this paper analyzes the problems and consequences brought by the current legal positioning of such litigation as administrative litigation,and discusses the existing debate between "administrative litigation theory" and "civil litigation theory".On the other hand,starting from the issue of trademark invalidation adjudication right,it is discussed that the legislation only allowing the original Trademark Review and Adjudication Board to declare trademark invalidation is an unreasonable restriction on the freedom of the parties to choose the way to solve disputes,and it also brings efficiency and justice problems.At the same time,it also analyzes the current dispute about whether the court should be given the power to independently judge the validity of trademarks.The second chapter proves the judicial authority of trademark invalidation request dispute theoretically.On one hand,from the two dimensions of the dispute attribute of trademark invalidation request and the power source of trademark invalidation decision,this paper demonstrates the non-administrative nature of the lawsuit against trademark invalidation decision,and concludes that such lawsuit should be a civil lawsuit,that is,the court should have the final judgment power over trademark invalidation request dispute.On the other hand,starting from the theory of civil procedure law,this paper analyzes the basis of civil action right of the party directly filing invalidation request to the court,and concludes that the party has corresponding right and the court has the obligation and power to adjudicate the invalidation request.Chapter three puts forward some legislative suggestions on improving the judicial adjudication of trademark invalidation request dispute settlement.On one hand,the legislation should make clear the position of civil action against trademark invalidation adjudication and establish the status of “quasi-judicial procedure” for trademark invalidation by application.For the follow-up judicial procedure of trademark invalidation,the civil procedure of two trials shall be carried out.On the other hand,the court should be empowered to independently judge the trademark invalidation request.The prior right holder or interested party is allowed to bring an invalidation suit to the court based on relative grounds;At the same time,the trademark invalid defense system should be established to allow the parties to raise invalid defense of trademark in the infringement lawsuit,but the principle of limitation and relativity should be followed.