Japanese Companies and Shareholder Empowerment

CHEN Nan

doi:10.15057/74241

Bibliographic Information

Other Title

日本企業と株主エンパワーメント（shareholder empowerment）
ニホンキギョウトカブヌシエンパワーメント : shareholder empowerment

Search this article

Description

After financial crisis, regulatory reforms which empower institution investors shareholders to participate in corporate governance have been adopted in UK and US. This shareholder empowerment trend originates from Anglo-American corporate governance system characterized by shareholder primacy and soon spreads to Japan since 2013. This article examines whether shareholder empowerment is suitable for Japanese companies and Japanese corporate governance system which is generally known as a stakeholder-focused type. By historically exploring the nearly 100-years change of Japanese corporate governance system and corporate law, this article finds that after banking crisis and the collapse of the bubble economy in 1990s, today’s Japanese system is by no means same as the typical one as above, but more like a middle ground between typical Japanese system and Anglo-American system. Still, we need to recognize that today’s Japanese system is not enough for shareholder empowerment and its related regulations to be effectively conducted. However, by analyzing the Growth Strategy and Ito review, this article further illustrates that the real task for today’s Japanese companies is to build a shareholder-focused corporate governance system in order to attract capital from aboard, and at the same time to avoid the short-termism which have already occurred in shareholder value-focused Angle-American system. Shareholder empowerment and its related regulations is believed to contribute to the task in Japanese companies.

Journal

一橋法学

一橋法学 21 (2), 313-382, 2022-07

一橋大学大学院法学研究科