18 - Intellectual Property Law and Empirical Research

Summary

In recent decades, empirical research has developed across many areas of intellectual property law. This chapter examines challenges that can arise in conducting, or drawing upon, empirical research in IP law. These include assessing a study’s value in terms of methodology, sample choice and size, execution and reporting, as well as the conclusions that might reasonably be drawn from the research. As IP scholars generate more empirically informed research, there can be value in asking whether the studies are robust and well executed, whether they reveal information or viewpoints previously not recognised, and whether they produce work from which legal or scholarly lessons can be drawn. Robust, well-conducted and analysed empirical studies may provide insights that develop IP scholarship in new ways and potentially improve policy and decision making. This underlines the importance of not being complacent about empirical analysis but being open to rigorous questioning, both individually and collectively, about our practices.