A decade after the Global Financial Crisis and Great Recession, developed economies continue to struggle under excessive household debt. While exacerbating inequality and political unrest, this debt - when combined with wage stagnation and a shrinking welfare state - has played a key role in maintaining economic growth and allowing households faced with rising costs of living to make ends meet. In Bankruptcy: The Case for Relief in an Economy of Debt, Joseph Spooner examines this economic model and finds it increasingly unsustainable. In a call to action to reduce debt burden, he turns to bankruptcy law, which is uniquely situated as a mechanism of social insurance against the risks of a debt-dependent economy. This book should be read by anyone interested in understanding the problem of consumer debt and how best to address it.
Close corporations, which are legal forms popular with small and medium enterprises, are crucial to every major economy's private sector. However, unlike their 'public' corporation counterparts, close corporation minority shareholders have limited exit options, and are structurally vulnerable in conflicts with majority or controlling shareholders. 'Withdrawal remedies'-legal mechanisms enabling aggrieved shareholders to exit companies with monetary claims-are potent minority shareholder protection mechanisms. This book critically examines the theory and operation of withdrawal remedies in four jurisdictions: the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Japan. Developing and applying a theoretical and comparative framework to the analysis of these jurisdictions' withdrawal remedies, this book proposes a model withdrawal remedy that is potentially applicable to any jurisdiction. With its international, functional, and comparative analysis of withdrawal remedies, it challenges
In The Financial Courts, Jo Braithwaite analyses thirty years of cases involving the global derivatives markets, exploring the nature of these legal disputes and assessing their impact on financial markets and on commercial law more broadly. Weaving together this substantial body of cases with theoretical insights drawn from the growing literature on the internationalisation of financial law, Braithwaite offers readers a detailed and highly original contribution to the debate about the role of private law in international financial markets. This important work should be read by lawyers, economists and regulators in the field.
The economic importance of the non-profit sector is growing rapidly in the USA and Europe. However, the law has not kept abreast with its development. The European Court of Justice has extended certain freedoms of the EC Treaty to non-profit organisations, and more case law is expected to follow in the near future, but the observations, theories, solutions and legal and non-legal rules in this field are manifold. The chances of harmonising the law on a European level are slim. Despite these differences, a common core of international corporate governance problems and regulatory solutions can be seen. This volume of essays brings together a variety of international experts from both corporate governance and governance of non-profit organisations to compare the two areas and explore the lessons that can be learned regarding comparative corporate governance for non-profit organisations.
The recent financial crisis proved that pre-existing arrangements for the governance of global markets were flawed. With reform underway in the USA, the EU and elsewhere, Emilios Avgouleas explores some of the questions associated with building an effective governance system and analyses the evolution of existing structures. By critiquing the soft law structures dominating international financial regulation and examining the roles of financial innovation and the neo-liberal policies in the expansion of global financial markets, he offers a new epistemological reading of the causes of the global financial crisis. Requisite reforms leave serious gaps in cross-border supervision, in the resolution of global financial institutions and in the monitoring of risk originating in the shadow banking sector. To close these gaps and safeguard the stability of the international financial system, an evolutionary governance system is proposed that will also enhance the welfare role of global
This book explores the foundations and evolution of modern corporate fiduciary law in the United States and the United Kingdom. Today US and UK fiduciary law provide very different approaches to the regulation of directorial behaviour. However, as the book shows, the law in both jurisdictions borrowed from the same sources in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century English fiduciary and commercial law. The book identifies the shared legal foundations and authorities and explores the drivers of corporate fiduciary law's contemporary divergence. In so doing it challenges the prevailing accounts of corporate legal change and stability in the US and the UK.
A decade after the Global Financial Crisis and Great Recession, developed economies continue to struggle under excessive household debt. While exacerbating inequality and political unrest, this debt - when combined with wage stagnation and a shrinking welfare state - has played a key role in maintaining economic growth and allowing households faced with rising costs of living to make ends meet. In Bankruptcy: The Case for Relief in an Economy of Debt, Joseph Spooner examines this economic model and finds it increasingly unsustainable. In a call to action to reduce debt burden, he turns to bankruptcy law, which is uniquely situated as a mechanism of social insurance against the risks of a debt-dependent economy. This book should be read by anyone interested in understanding the problem of consumer debt and how best to address it.
This collection of cutting-edge scholarship examines the law and policy of financial regulation using a combination of conceptual analysis and strong empirical research. The book's authors range from global leaders to rising stars in the field, all of whom shed light on complex questions of financial sector regulation theory and practice in key economies ranging from the EU to China. Key topics include the role of law in constituting financial markets, the efficiency of markets, the role of interest groups in shaping financial regulation, the interdependence and interactions of international financial regulation with international trade and monetary regimes, and problems of regulation in state capitalism economies. This exciting volume opens the road for further enrichment of the academic and policy-making dialogue on financial regulation and regulatory practice, and reflects new trends in legal and social-science scholarship.
What happens when a corporate subsidiary or network company is unable to pay personal injury victims in full? This book sets out to tackle the 'insolvent entity problem', especially as it arises in cases of mass wrongdoing such as those involving asbestos exposure and defective pharmaceuticals. After discussing the nature of corporate groups and networks from the perspectives of business history, organisation studies, and social theory, the book assesses a range of rules and proposed rules for extending liability for personal injuries beyond insolvent entities. New proposals are put forward for an exception to the rule of limited liability and for the development of a flexible new tort based on conspiracy that encompasses not only control-based relationships but also horizontal coordination between companies. The book concludes with a general discussion of lessons learned from debates about extended liability and provides guidelines for the development of new liability rules.
The business corporation is one of the greatest organizational inventions, but it creates risks both for shareholders and for third parties. To mitigate these risks, legislators, judges, and corporate lawyers have tried to learn from foreign experiences and adapt their regulatory regimes to them. In the last three decades, this approach has led to a stream of corporate and capital market law reforms unseen before. Corporate governance, the system by which companies are directed and controlled, is today a key topic for legislation, practice, and academia all over the world. Corporate scandals and financial crises have repeatedly highlighted the need to better understand the economic, social, political, and legal determinants of corporate governance in individual countries. Comparative Corporate Governance furthers this goal by bringing together current scholarship in law and economics with the expertise of local corporate governance specialists from twenty-three countries.
The rise of the independent director in Asia is an issue of global consequence that has been largely overlooked until recently. Less than two decades ago, independent directors were oddities in Asia's boardrooms. Today, they are ubiquitous. Independent Directors in Asia undertakes the first detailed analysis of this phenomenon. It provides in-depth historical, contextual and comparative perspectives on the law and practice of independent directors in seven core Asian jurisdictions (China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan) and Australia. These case studies reveal the varieties of independent directors in Asia, none of which conform to its original American concept. The authors develop a taxonomy of these varieties, which provides a powerful analytical tool for more accurately understanding and effectively researching independent directors in Asia. This new approach challenges foundational aspects of comparative corporate governance practice and suggests a new
Why and in what ways have lawyers been importing economic theories into a legal environment, and how has this shaped scholarly research, judicial and legislative work? Since the financial crisis, corporate or capital markets law has been the focus of attention by academia and media. Formal modelling has been used to describe how capital markets work and, later, has been criticised for its abstract assumptions. Empirical legal studies and regulatory impact assessments offered different ways forward. This book presents a new approach to the risks and benefits of interdisciplinary policy work. The benefits economic theory brings for reliable and tested lawmaking are contrasted with important challenges including the significant differences of research methodology, leading to misunderstandings and problems of efficient implementation of economic theory's findings into the legal world. Katja Langenbucher's innovative research scrutinises the potential of economic theory to European
This book explores the foundations and evolution of modern corporate fiduciary law in the United States and the United Kingdom. Today US and UK fiduciary law provide very different approaches to the regulation of directorial behaviour. However, as the book shows, the law in both jurisdictions borrowed from the same sources in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century English fiduciary and commercial law. The book identifies the shared legal foundations and authorities and explores the drivers of corporate fiduciary law's contemporary divergence. In so doing it challenges the prevailing accounts of corporate legal change and stability in the US and the UK.
A globe-spanning group of leading law and finance scholars bring together cutting-edge research to comprehensively examine the challenges legislators face in regulating related party transactions in a socially beneficial way. Combining theoretical analysis of the foundations of efficient regulation with empirical and comparative studies, readers are invited to draw their own conclusions on which regulatory responses work best under differing circumstances. The careful selection of surveyed jurisdictions offers in-depth insight into a broad variety of regulatory strategies and their interdependence with socioeconomic and political conditions. This work should be read by scholars, policymakers, and graduate students interested in a critical, much-debated area of corporate governance.
