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The relation between business and society
Piercing the corporate veil essays
The relation between business and society
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Capitalism and the Corporation
The problem to be investigated is what role business has within society with regard to social democracy, corporations and capitalism. In the book, Business Ethics, Case Studies and Selected Readings, case study 3.5 Michael Novak on Capitalism and the Corporation, Michael Novak states that, “Business corporations have transformed the world. They were indispensable in making it free and prosperous.” (Jennings, 2012, p. 105)
Britain vs. America
Business corporations have existed since the middle ages. The initial corporations were burial societies; then monasteries, towns and universities emerged as new corporations. With the birth of America, the older British world and the new world were at variance. The primary difference between the British and the U.S. Corporation was the ability of the Americans to create new corporations without considering the stodgy British laws that were undermining entrepreneurial activity throughout Europe. (Miller, 1998)
With the creation of the English railways a movement toward limited liability was spearheaded. The U.K. regards each corporation within an affiliated group as a separate legal entity, subject to piercing of the corporate veil only in exceptional circumstances generally involving intentional acts of deception or efforts to avoid a legal duty. The U.K. courts have demonstrated reluctance to pierce the corporate veil. Under the entity liability approach embraced by the U.K., the general rule is that the parent company is liable only for its own individual liabilities. (Miller, 1998, p. 80)
In Britain, people within corporations were seen as an exclusive group of people who were privileged but tightly controlled by the government. The strong desire for ...
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...eadings (Seventh edition).
Lavelle, A. (2008). Death of Social Democracy: Political Consequences in the 21st Century [Ebrary Reader]. Retrieved from: http://web.ebscohost.com.proxy1.ncu.edu http://site.ebrary.com.proxy1.ncu.edu/lib/ncent/docDetail.action?docID=10228274
McCutchen, P. (2005). Three Steps to Improve Your Company RQ (Reputation Quotient) for Better Profitability. Retrieved from http://phil-mccutchen.wrytestuff.com/swa8074.htm
Miller, S. K. (1998). Piercing the corporate veil among affiliated companies in the European Community and in the U.S.: a comparative analysis of U.S., German, and U.K. veil-piercing approaches. American Business Law Journal, 36, 73-149. doi:10.1111/j.1744-1714.1998.tb01017.x
Tagliabue, J. (1997, October 3). Old world charm bumps into new world economics. New York Times. Retrieved from: http://web.ebscohost.com.proxy1.ncu.edu
During the early 1900's three men arose from the populous to form a new breed of businessmen: the capitalist CEO. They were all men of who brought themselves from living lives of the ordinary, working, and dreaming of greater things, to actually living those dreams and conducting themselves in ruling over vast monetary empires. However, it has been discussed weather or not these men played important roles in the economical development of our country, or if they were just greedy men questing ever for the shine of gold, iron, oil, and the feel of cold cash between their fingers.
Mills and Marx would look at today’s American capitalist corporations the same way they did years ago. Unfortunately,
The role of corporation has a large impact on 21st century society. Coporations place in modern society is omnipresent, consumers are conditioned by the corporate advertising. In Rushoff’s Once Removed: The Corporate Life-form, corporatism is defined as “a way to suppress lateral transactions between people or small companies and instead redirect any and all value they created to a group of investors” (p. 1). Corporatism in today’s modern society is becoming more and more present, as large businesses have seemed to continue taking over smaller “mom and pop” businesses. Everything we own relies on corporation, everything is produced by large companies on global scale. We receive electronics from China, garments from India and Thailand, and oil
Hirschhorn, L. & Gilmore, T. (1992). The New Boundaries of the 'Boundaryless' Company. Harvard Business Review, 70: 104-115.
In late 19th century, as Social Darwinism grew, riches were God’s favor and the poor became inferior people. According to the saying of “the fittest survives”, most entrepreneurs did everything they could control the competition that threatened the growth of their business empire. They monopolized the business and controlled the biggest market power, which are called trusts. Monopolies and trusts impacted American society politically, economically, and socially by eliminating the competition, controlling the government, and controlling the prices of supplies.
As a framework for identifying and analyzing many common business ethics problems, the contractual theory focuses our attention on the need to provide adequate safeguards for each constituency's interests. Corporate governance is concerned primarily with protecting shareholder interests, in part because the special contracting problems of shareholders are best met by the residual claims that the law of corporate governance creates. The comparative neglect of other constituencies in corporate law is not a matter of concern as long as their interests are adequately protected in some way. How the interests of each constituency are protected--whether by means of corporate governance structures or other means--is a matter of what works best in practice. Before we can devise means for protecting the interests of each ...
Shareholder Agreements offers a mechanism to the founding members of a company to regulate (and sometimes restrict) the shares allotted to the stakeholders. Though the restrictive covenants do not carry much favour by courts unless they form part of the company’s bylaws, yet they offer a way in which owners of a company can invite and incentivize talent – all the while regulating the flow of actual stake. The policies of a company, and sometime even ownership, can be jeopardized in an unregulated scenario.
West’s Encyclopedia of American Law, defines corporate personality as “The distinct status of a business organization that has complied with law for its recognition a legal entity and that has an independent legal existence from that of its officers, directors, and shareholders” (2008). According to this definition, the corporation has the ability to sue and be sued, buy, sell and lease property in its own name but that it is separate from is officers and shareholders. However, we find that this is not necessarily true, as in the case of Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores,
In conclusion, in the documentary Capitalism: A Love Story the producers suggest that the profit motive should be replaced by democracy through the use of a first person narration, recorded discussions, and footages. The message being sent is to subvert the current system because of its harmful effects to society and to adjust it into a productive foundation where everyone makes an equal effort for the common good. Allowing a business private ownership is like taking out security cameras from stores and banks. Bank robbers will be enabled to steal all the money leaving the banks in despair until, society agrees to do something about it.
Salomon v Salomon & Co Ltd illustrates a typical case in company law. The opinion that a company has an independent personality has since been established. It was clearly pointed out the company needs to be responsible for all its acts and the assets of the company are separated from the members ' personal financial affairs. While the Companies Law of 1862 was updated, there is room for improvement in terms of the somewhat ill-defined requirements concerning members ' and shareholders ' interests and liabilities. This situation has led the Government to revise the law relating to companies
The concept of corporate personhood, that corporations can be granted many of the same constitutional rights and protections as natural persons, has become increasingly controversial as the law has been reinterpreted to expand the purview of corporate personhood more than any other time in American history. To address this concern, I argue that corporations should be considered to have legal personhood less equal than to that of a human because, relative to a natural person, corporations exist and operate in an inherently and fundamentally different context that provides corporations undue political and legal influence and gives corporations the ability to limit rights and protections
The Principle of Separate Corporate Personality The principle of separate corporate personality has been firmly established in the common law since the decision in the case of Salomon v Salomon & Co Ltd[1], whereby a corporation has a separate legal personality, rights and obligations totally distinct from those of its shareholders. Legislation and courts nevertheless sometimes "pierce the corporate veil" so as to hold the shareholders personally liable for the liabilities of the corporation. Courts may also "lift the corporate veil", in the conflict of laws in order to determine who actually controls the corporation, and thus to ascertain the corporation's true contacts, and closest and most real connection. Throughout the course of this assignment I will begin by explaining the concept of legal personality and describe the veil of incorporation. I will give examples of when the veil of incorporation can be lifted by the courts and statuary provisions such as s.24 CA 1985 and incorporate the varying views of judges as to when the veil can be lifted.
The doctrine of separate legal personality is central to corporate law and the functioning of companies in the modern world. This doctrine allows for a company, separate from its shareholders and members, to own its own property, have its own rights and responsibilities, and sue and be sued as its own entity. This means that the rights enjoyed by the company are not necessarily enjoyed by its members, and that members of a company are not necessarily liable for the actions of the company. In the recent case Prest v Petrodel, the doctrine of separate legal personality and the instances in which a court may pierce the corporate veil were discussed. Piercing the corporate veil refers to putting aside the separate personality of the company to hold a person who owns and controls a company as responsible for the actions of the company as if it were their own. In the case of Prest this concept is discussed in detail, to reflect the instances in which courts have pierced the corporate veil, and the extent of applicability of this doctrine. As reflected in Prest, the separate legal personality doctrine is a strong doctrine in corporate law that is only pierced in exceptional circumstances. However, it is also clear that the principle of piercing the corporate veil is an important one, as it allows for the court to hold responsible those in control of a company in instances where it is necessary to achieve an equitable and logi...
History discovers that although some forms of companies are thought to have existed during Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece, the closest recognizable ancestors of the modern company did not appear until the second millennium. Early companies were purely economic ventures; it was only belatedly realized that an incidental benefit of holding joint stock was that the company's stock could not be seized for the debts of any individual member .
The Corporation is a Canadian documentary film written by Joe Bakan, a law professor from British Columbia University and directed by Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbott in 2003. Many issues related to the corporate world were discussed in the film including corporate social responsibility (CSR). CSR is generally quite a new concept being within the corporate industry where the recognition of the need to implement such theory within the business operations has only been widely practiced in recent times. Developed countries like France, Canada, United States and United Kingdom all have different interpretation of what’s CSR actually means due to their social and cultural differences while most of them seem to recognize the significance of triple-bottom