This innovative collection comprises a series of chapters by noted authors on important current issues in corporate law and governance in honour of Emeritus Professor Ian Ramsay AO – Australia’s leading corporate law and governance scholar. Authors include former judges of the High Court of Australia and the Supreme Court of New South Wales, the chair of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, and prominent Australian and international academics.
The book provides extensive expert analysis of specific areas that are experiencing significant change and evolution, with an Introduction that draws together issues and themes from the in-depth analysis found in each chapter.
Themes include: (a) the impact of environmental, social and governance issues on financial regulation, corporate governance and shareholders; (b) emerging issues for statutory and general law duties of care and to act in good faith in the interests of the corporation; (c) the complexity and scope of corporate law legislation and governance; (d) the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on corporate law, corporate governance and financial regulation; and (e) the impact of technology on financial regulation, corporate governance, the consumer credit sector and ASIC’s regulatory strategies.
A theme that permeates all of the chapters is the way in which the corporate form – together with corporate law and corporate governance – have adapted to change, and the ways in which they may need to be reformed further.
Foreword
The Hon Kenneth Hayne AC KC
Introduction
Rosemary Teele Langford and Miranda Webster
1.‘No Body to be Kicked or Soul to be Damned’: The Limits of a Legal Fiction
PA Keane AC KC
2. Commercial Trusts and the Liability of Beneficiaries: Are Commercial Trusts a Satisfactory Vehicle to be Used in Modern Day Commerce?
The Hon T F Bathurst AC KC
3. Corporate Regulation in Australia: The Legacy of Ian Ramsay
Joseph Longo
4. When (if ever) Should Corporations Legislation Lay Down Succinct Normative Standards without Prescriptive Rules?
RP Austin
5. Pursuing the Judicial Foundation for the Obligation of Directors to Consider the Interests of their Financially Distressed Company’s Creditors
Andrew Keay
6. Directors as Monitors in Collective Investment Schemes
Professor Pamela Hanrahan
7. The Failure of Corporate Law Reform in Australia
Dr Jason Harris
8. Building Resilient, Innovative and Sustainable Financial Ecosystems: Fintech, Regulation and Digital Financial Infrastructure
Douglas W Arner, Ross P Buckley, and Dirk A Zetzsche
9. A Duty to Use Artificial Intelligence? Learning from the Past and Hedging for the Future
Andrew Godwin
10. The Role of Technological Innovation in the Evolution of Corporate Engagement
Steve Kourabas
11. An Increasingly Middle-Class Phenomenon’: The Causes and Impacts of Financial Hardship in Australia
Lucinda O’Brien and Paul Ali
Read the Foreword by The Hon Kenneth Hayne AC KC from Corporate Law and Governance in the 21st Century: Essays in Honour of Professor Ian Ramsay
Corporate Law and Governance in the 21st Century is indeed a thought provoking book and a fitting tribute to Professor Ramsay’s work and contribution to this field.
Dan Butler KC, Hearsay, Issue 95: March 2024
