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Saint Louis University School of Law

Business Organizations Law

Theory of the firm

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Full-Text Articles in Law

The Next Iteration Of Progressive Corporate Law, Matthew T. Bodie Jan 2017

The Next Iteration Of Progressive Corporate Law, Matthew T. Bodie

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A wave of progressive corporate law scholarship in the late 1980s and early 1990s reimagined corporate law from the perspective of employees, consumers, and other stakeholders left behind by shareholder primacy. Almost thirty years later, it is time to revisit this literature and consider what progressive corporate law should be in the 21st Century. This essay argues for three changes: (1) a move to the theory of the firm as the underlying economic literature; (2) a focus on employees, rather than stakeholders more generally, and (3) an effort to change statutory and structural aspects of corporate law, such as board …


Participation As A Theory Of Employment, Matthew T. Bodie Jan 2013

Participation As A Theory Of Employment, Matthew T. Bodie

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The concept of employment is an important legal category, not only for labor and employment law, but also for intellectual property law, torts, criminal law, and tax. The right-to-control test has dominated the debate over the definition of “employee” since its origins in the master-servant doctrine. However, the test no longer represents our modern notion of what it means to be an employee. This change has played itself out in research on the theory of the firm, which has shifted from a model of control to a model of participation in a team production process. This Article uses the theory …


The Post-Revolutionary Period In Corporate Law: Returning To The Theory Of The Firm, Matthew T. Bodie Jan 2012

The Post-Revolutionary Period In Corporate Law: Returning To The Theory Of The Firm, Matthew T. Bodie

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Law and economics revolutionized the study of corporate law. However, while modern finance theory and attendant empirical research continue to explore the effects of law on shareholder value, the theory of the firm literature has been underutilized. This paper, presented as part of the Berle III: Theory of the Firm Symposium at Seattle University School of Law, argues that corporate law scholars should turn their attention back to this literature and develop a deeper understanding of the corporation as firm.