Protection of Shareholders' Rights in Joint-Stock Limited Companies

Author: Liu Junhai
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-01-01
Features: The joint-stock company is a product of commodity economic activities. Under the highly centralized planned economy system, joint-stock companies disappeared from China's socio-economic life due to the absence of their survival soil, and shareholders and shareholder rights became unfamiliar concepts to people. Even the investors of state-owned enterprises were not referred to as shareholders but were vaguely categorized as administrative power entities. With the advancement of economic system reform, especially alongside the practice of transforming state-owned enterprises into companies, shareholders and shareholder rights gradually became familiar to people. At the same time, the issue of protecting shareholder rights has become prominent. Here, it is necessary not only to legally protect the self-interested rights of shareholders but also to legally protect their co-beneficial rights. For this reason, China's Company Law, like that of other countries, has made provisions on multiple aspects. However, in terms of protecting shareholder rights, how to transform the theoretical Company Law into a practical one remains a relatively complex matter. It involves both people's familiarity with the system and their understanding of the concepts. Therefore, it requires serious research from commercial law scholars.
Shareholders are the stakeholders in the existence, operation, and development of a company, but they are not the only rights-holders. The protection of shareholder rights involves the adjustment of various relationships between shareholders and other stakeholders, and the elaboration of shareholder rights necessarily touches upon many areas of the Company Law. Even in terms of the occurrence of shareholder rights, it involves the relationship between shareholders and the company. Since the company's actions must be realized through its organs, the realization and protection of shareholder rights also involve the relationship between shareholders and directors. At the same time, the protection of shareholder rights also involves the relationships among shareholders themselves and the balancing of multiple interests. Therefore, the protection of shareholder rights is a substantial systematic project.
Liu Junhai's The Protection of Shareholder Rights in Joint-Stock Companies employs various research methods to conduct an in-depth study of the issues surrounding shareholder rights, making it a noteworthy achievement in creating this systematic project. The work focuses on the status of shareholders in the company and the Company Law, viewing the protection of shareholder rights as a multi-dimensional structure. It presents arguments with substantial evidence and a fresh perspective, combining the practice of Chinese companies to propose some innovative theoretical insights, demonstrating the author's depth of research in this field. However, the work does not absolutize the protection of shareholder rights. The author's discussion in the book about the social responsibilities that companies undertake and their potential impact on shareholder rights is a noteworthy issue.