Can this marriage be saved? Reconciling progressivism with profits in corporate governance laws
In this note, Robert Schulze examines a collection of critiques of the corporate law theory paradigm. Although the current paradigm focuses on maximizing shareholder profits to optimize societal wealth, these critique essays argue that this focus ultimately fails to meet societal needs. According to these authors, corporate law should concomitantly protect other corporate constituents, such as labor, consumers, the environment, local communities, and unsophisticated investors. Although Schulze finds that some of these critiques powerfully challenge the current paradigm, he argues that their reforms would not ameliorate the concerns highlighted and would probably fail in practice. He concludes that other policy interventions may more effectively answer the authors' criticisms.