Common Challenges Facing Shareholder Suits in Europe and the United States
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James D. Cox
Episodic and even sometimes systematic misbehavior by businessmen and corporate entities is ubiquitous. While Enron and WorldCom were the battle cries for corporate reform in the U.S. so it was with Ahold and Parmalat across Europe. No country is free of concern that company officers will misbehave thereby injuring investors, consumers and destroying shareholder value. Thus, this symposium issue collects the recent experiences across Europe in strengthening shareholder suits. Most recent legislative efforts in Europe, and hence the comments in the symposium, are focused on the derivative suit. Just as the American experience with class actions, reviewed separately in this symposium, is long and rich, it is also possible to draw upon the American experience to emphasize the challenges law reform faces on both sides of the Atlantic in energizing the derivative suit. The following addresses multiple themes that pervade the various articles exploring the derivative suit in Europe and hopefully provides a useful perspective drawn from the American experience with derivative suits.
© Copyright 2009 by the European Company and Financial Law Review (ECFR)
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Welcome Address
- Mapping the American Shareholder Litigation Experience: A Survey of Empirical Studies of the Enforcement of the U.S. Securities Law
- Discussion Report
- Shareholders' Lawsuits against the Management of a Company and its Shareholders under French Law
- Shadows of the Past and Back to the Future: Part 11 of the UK Companies Act 2006 (in)action
- Discussion Report: On the Presentations by Prof. Bernard Grelon, Université Paris IX, and Dr. Arad Reisberg, University College London
- Representative Litigation in Italian Capital Markets: Italian Derivative Suits and (if ever) Securities Class Actions
- Shareholder Suits against the Directors of a Company, against other Shareholders and against the Company itself under Belgian Law
- Shareholder Derivative Suits: A Comparative Analysis and the Implications of the European Shareholders' Rights Directive
- Shareholder Suits: Common Problems, Different Solutions and First Steps towards a Possible Harmonisation by Means of a European Model Code
- Common Challenges Facing Shareholder Suits in Europe and the United States
- Reconciling the European Registered Capital Regime with Modern Corporate Reorganization Law: Experience from the Czech Insolvency Law Reform
- Congress Announcement: 4th ECFR Conference
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Welcome Address
- Mapping the American Shareholder Litigation Experience: A Survey of Empirical Studies of the Enforcement of the U.S. Securities Law
- Discussion Report
- Shareholders' Lawsuits against the Management of a Company and its Shareholders under French Law
- Shadows of the Past and Back to the Future: Part 11 of the UK Companies Act 2006 (in)action
- Discussion Report: On the Presentations by Prof. Bernard Grelon, Université Paris IX, and Dr. Arad Reisberg, University College London
- Representative Litigation in Italian Capital Markets: Italian Derivative Suits and (if ever) Securities Class Actions
- Shareholder Suits against the Directors of a Company, against other Shareholders and against the Company itself under Belgian Law
- Shareholder Derivative Suits: A Comparative Analysis and the Implications of the European Shareholders' Rights Directive
- Shareholder Suits: Common Problems, Different Solutions and First Steps towards a Possible Harmonisation by Means of a European Model Code
- Common Challenges Facing Shareholder Suits in Europe and the United States
- Reconciling the European Registered Capital Regime with Modern Corporate Reorganization Law: Experience from the Czech Insolvency Law Reform
- Congress Announcement: 4th ECFR Conference
