The complex relationship between Intellectual Property (IP) and Open Science (OS) deserves to be investigated with reference to one of the most important centers of Research and Innovation (R&I): the university. In a stylized model of R&I in the context of a free-market capitalist system, there are, upstream, the public sector and universities that create basic research following the principles of OS and, downstream, a competitive market that carries out applied research, produces and markets new technologies using Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs). The competitiveness of the market drives down the price of technology, so that access to innovation is guaranteed through contracts or redistributive mechanisms (e.g. public subsidies). However, this model hides the friction between IP and OS. A first example of friction between IP and OS relates to scientific publications. A second example concerns university patents in the biomedical field. This paper focuses on the European Union (EU) R&I policies. To understand the merits and shortcomings of EU policies, a good investigation methodology is needed. The one used in the following reasoning is inspired not only by the usual methods and tools of comparative law but also by a new movement that goes by the name of ‘Law and Political Economy’ and sees among its promoters Amy Kapczynski (Yale University). The premise from which the movement starts is that politics and economics cannot be separated and that both are closely intertwined with law. In an era marked by climate change, huge and growing inequalities as well as wars that threaten democratic systems, it is necessary to investigate phenomena - in this case, the relationship between IP and OS - with the three dimensions of politics, economics and law in mind. In EU policies, on the one hand, actions promoting universities’ OS are growing, and on the other hand, IPRs are being extended and their use and transfer to private individuals is being encouraged in academic institutions themselves. In a R&I ecosystem dominated by the intellectual monopoly capitalism, the promotion of OS runs the risk of being, at best, ineffective or limitedly effective and, at worst, a tool to strengthen the monopolies themselves.