Gli assetti organizzativi dell’ente certificatore nella disciplina dei marchi di certificazione

This paper aims to analyse certification as an increasingly important sector in today’s economic and legal reality. In the face of this growing centrality of certification, which in truth is not surprising, it is instead surprising how the issue of regulating this business activity has not received particular attention. From this point of view, the two aspects here further investigated – corporate governance and intellectual property – prove to be of pri- mary importance. After a general framing of certification as a market phenomenon, the current normative framework applicable to certification bodies will be reconstructed, with the pivotal role of independence in defining their adequate organizational structures. However, in the absence of effective legal norms and in the insufficiency of standardized technical norms, an interpretative solution that relies on intellectual property rights will be provided: specifically, the new certification mark and the relevant “neutrality” requirement is deemed to represent a suitable legal basis for regulating the independence of certification bodies, as a fundamental principle of this economic activity.