Jean Monnet 30 Years and European Corporate Governance Studies

Abstract

This essay has focused on the importance of searching for common solutions for relevant common corporate governance problems in European countries. 30 years ago, the Jean Monnet Action was born, named after one of the EU Pioneers, the first president of the executive body of the European Coal and Steel Community, Jean Monnet (1888–1979). The first part of this essay presents a short story about Jean Monnet in the 1950s which seems surprisingly relevant for our corporate governance research in Europe nowadays and describes key features of the Jean Monnet Action in 1989-2009. The second part briefly discusses three major types of recent EU problems: the real issues, the fake issues and the major risk of no EU, and the role of the Jean Monnet Action to increase European identification. The third part focuses on the recently established Jean Monnet Network on Corporate Governance and European Union Integration (CGEUI) and the need for presenting systematic evidence about the emerging ownership patterns in European countries following the corporate governance movement in the 1990s and the 2000s. Finally, the essay discusses a few unsolved problems and challenges of European corporate governance research like the impact of “global special interests” and “the harmful corporate obsession with maximizing shareholder returns at all costs”. In searching for relevant agenda for European corporate governance studies, nowadays the main concern appears the rise of corporations and their concentration of economic power which can compete on equal terms with the European welfare states.