Convergence and Persistence in Corporate Insolvency Law: Employee Participation in Corporate Insolvency Restructuring

Abstract

Systems of corporate governance are not static. Rather, they are constantly evolving and are shaped and redesigned through formal legal rules, judicial decisions, business practices and changes in the prevailing ideological consensus. The 2007–2008 ‘credit crunch’ and the subsequent recession call for a reconsideration of the role of labour within the mechanisms of corporate governance and control. Accordingly, employee voice mechanisms, existing and potential, will be re-assessed in the academic realm and also as part of a wider renewed political discourse. Assessing the potential for implementation and prospects of employee voice is paramount within this process, and central to its success. The analysis made below maintains that regulations and their outcomes are the result of a blend of factors which interact with one another. It constructs a sociological and political explanation for the laws and actual practices concerned with the influence of employees on the firm’s strategic decision-making process. Focusing on the legal regime which governs corporate insolvency restructuring in Germany, the US and the UK, and specifically the legal crossroads where capital and labour interact, this article reaffirms the view that capitalist systems create institutional structures which are difficult to alter, whereas developing mechanisms of employee voice are likely to adjust and ultimately reflect the existing institutional structure.