Christian Klawitter studied law at the University of Hamburg. From 1981 to 1984, he worked there as a research assistant. In 1995, he was appointed lecturer in intellectual property law and copyright law at the University of Duisburg-Essen, where he was made honorary professor in 2006. In addition, he was a lecturer at Humboldt University in Berlin for many years in the field of licence agreement law in the LL.M. program in intellectual property and media law.

Christian Klawitter has published numerous specialist articles and papers, most recently on issues relating to design protection. He is co-author of the third edition of the "Handbuch des Fachanwalts Gewerblicher Rechtsschutz" (Handbook for Specialised Lawyers in Intellectual Property Law), published by the renowned Carl Heymanns Verlag, in which he provides comprehensive commentary on national and European design law. He is also co-author of the section "Lizenzverträge" (Licence Agreements) in the "Handbuch des Kartellrechts" (Handbook of Antitrust Law), the fifth edition of which was published by C.H. Beck in 2026. His book "Licence Agreements and Antitrust Law" was published in its second edition in 2015.

Christian Klawitter is past president and member of the advisory board of the German national group of the LES Licensing Executives Society. In 2004, he was appointed to the expert committee for design law of the German Association forIndustrial Property and Copyright (GRUR), of which he was a member until 2024. He was also a member of the expert committee on copyright law of the German Cultural Council until 2024. Christian Klawitter is ranked among Germany's best commercial lawyers in the annual Best Lawyers Ranking published in Handelsblatt. Wirtschaftswoche magazine names him among the top 25 lawyers in trademark law.

Outside of his professional life, his main interest is contemporary art. He is an active member of the ACC Working Group on Corporate Collecting in the Cultural Circle of German Business, founding trustee and advisory board member of the Else Heiliger Fund, an initiative based at the Konrad Adenauer Foundation to promote promising young artists, and chairman of the board of the Overbeck Society, the art association of his hometown of Lübeck, which celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2018.