Corporate Law
Order Description
Please find the following handout below for your guidance:
1. Purpose of limited liability company; (Dignam & Lowry)
2. The Nature and Purpose of Company:
– F. Easterbrook & D. Fischel “Limited Liability and the Corporation” (1985)
– H. Hansmann, R. Kraakman & R. Squire, “Law and the Rise of the Firm” (2006) 110 Harvard Law Review 1333
– Posner “Economic Analysis of Law”
– H. Manne “Our Two Corporation Systems “Law and Economics” (1967)
3. Criticisms of the nature of the company:
– Infringes a moral principle as to personal responsibility for debt
Schluter, M., “Risk, reward and responsibility: limited liability and company reform”, (2000) Cambridge Papers Vol. 9(2)
– Encourages undue risk-taking at creditors’ expense
Freedman, J., “Limited liability: large company theory and small firms” (2000)
– Enables shareholders to evade tort liabilities
H. Hansmann & R. Kraakman, “Towards Unlimited Shareholder Liability for Corporate Torts” (1991) Yale Law Journal Vol. 100, p. 1879
– Is inappropriate for small businesses
Hicks, A., “Limiting the Rise of Limited Liability” (1997) in R. Baldwin (ed.) “Law, Uncertainty and Legal Processes” (London: Kluwer Law International), Ch. 6
4. Principle of the Corporate Law:
Petrodel Resources Ltd v. Prest [2013] UKSC 34
Per Lord Sumption:
“”Piercing the corporate veil” is an expression rather indiscriminately used to describe a number of things. Properly speaking, it means disregarding the separate personality of the company.”
See also Ottolenghi “From Peeping Behind the Corporate Veil to Ignoring it Completely” (1990)
A timeline: Dignam & Lowry, op. cit., pp. 35 – 37:
Classical veil lifting, 1897 – 1966
The interventionist years, 1966 – 1989
Back to basics, 1989 – present
(i) The “evasion principle”
Petrodel Resources Ltd v. Prest [2013] UKSC 34
5. Agency?
6. Tourt Liability
7. Salamon Case
use OSCOLA for the references’s style
