“商标个案审查原则”的误读与澄清

The Misreading and Clarifying of the Principle of“Trademark Case-by-case Review”

商标案件大多涉及显著性、知名度、近似及混淆可能等实体问题,而这些问题又非常复杂,且包含不确定的主观判断,故法院发展出灵活弹性的"多因素综合考量"加以应对,其后果是"个案审查"现象在商标法实践中日益突出。在未能了解其背后机理的情况下,人们很容易误认为其与"同案同判""遵循先例"等理念相冲突,并试图通过追求"审查标准一致性原则"来排除"个案审查原则"的适用。唯有从学理和逻辑上澄清"个案审查"与"同案同判"之间的界限,才能化干戈为玉帛,保证裁判的客观公正。

In most trademark cases,the normative issues such as distinctiveness,popularity,similarity and the likelihood of confusion are very complicated and comprise very uncertain judgement of subjectivity.For dealing with these issues,the courts developed the"multifactor test"and resulted in inevitably an extrusive phenomenon,which called"case-by-case review".Without Understanding its rationale,the"case-by-case review"is easily misread be conflicting with the doctrines of"like cases alike"or"stare decisis"and should be excluded by the principle of so-called"the consistency of review standard".Only by clarifying the boundary between"case-by-case review"and"like cases alike",we can defuse the contradiction and ensure the fairness of judicial judgement.