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Corporate Power Is Corporate Purpose I: Evidence From My Hometown, Leo E. Strine Jr.
Corporate Power Is Corporate Purpose I: Evidence From My Hometown, Leo E. Strine Jr.
All Faculty Scholarship
This paper is the first in a series considering a rather tired argument in corporate governance circles, that corporate laws that give only rights to stockholders somehow implicitly empower directors to regard other constituencies as equal ends in governance. By continuing to suggest that corporate boards themselves are empowered to treat the best interests of other corporate constituencies as ends in themselves, no less important than stockholders, scholars and commentators obscure the need for legal protections for other constituencies and for other legal reforms that give these constituencies the means to more effectively protect themselves.
Using recent events in the …
How Corporate Governance Is Made: The Case Of The Golden Leash, Matthew D. Cain, Jill E. Fisch, Sean J. Griffith, Steven Davidoff Solomon
How Corporate Governance Is Made: The Case Of The Golden Leash, Matthew D. Cain, Jill E. Fisch, Sean J. Griffith, Steven Davidoff Solomon
All Faculty Scholarship
This Article presents a case study of a corporate governance innovation—the incentive compensation arrangement for activist-nominated director candidates colloquially known as the “golden leash.” Golden leash compensation arrangements are a potentially valuable tool for activist shareholders in election contests. In response to their use, several issuers adopted bylaw provisions banning incentive compensation arrangements. Investors, in turn, viewed director adoption of golden leash bylaws as problematic and successfully pressured issuers to repeal them.
The study demonstrates how corporate governance provisions are developed and deployed, the sequential response of issuers and investors, and the central role played by governance intermediaries—activist investors, institutional …