Company Law and Economic Protectionism: New Challenges to European Integration [Hardcover]

A collection of essays examining the conflict between EU law and company law, covering a broad range of topics including takeovers, mergers and restructuring, sovereign wealth funds, and proportionality of ownership and control.The financial crisis has brought about a revival of state protectionism across the globe. Most Western leaders have made a virtue of big government and state intervention; bail-outs and Sovereign Wealth Funds have been among the first responses to the economic contraction. Company law rules are one of the instruments frequently used to restrict or to discourage integration or to deter foreign investment. Examples for the new protectionism can be seen in a wide range of legislative and regulatory measures, for instance state measures preventing foreign takeovers, 'golden shares' or laws on foreign direct investment targeting Sovereign Wealth Funds, mainly from Asia.This book presents timely research by a number of company law and EU law experts into this field of law. The chapters cover a broad range of topics, spanning from takeovers/mergers over the one share-one vote debate through to the foreclosure of markets against Sovereign Wealth Funds.1: Ulf Bernitz and Wolf-Georg Ringe: IntroductionPart I: EU Law and Economic Protectionism2: Klaus Hopt: European Company and Financial Law: Observations on European Politics, Protectionism, and the Financial Crisis3: Crispin Waymouth: Is 'Protectionism' a Useful Concept for Company Law and Foreign Investment Policy? An EU Perspective4: Jonathan Rickford: Protectionism, Capital Freedom and the Internal Market5: Andrea Bioni: When the State is the Owner: some further comments on the Court of Justice 'golden shares' strategyPart II: Takeovers and Mergers6: Paul Davies, Edmund-Philipp Schuster, and Emilie van de Walle de Ghelcke: The Takeover Directive as a Protectionist Tool?7: Andrew Johnston: Varieties of Corporate Governance and Reflexive Takeover Regulation8: Jesper Lau Hansen: Cross-Border Restructurl8