On European Companies in Private International Law

The economic and political rise of the European Union may be stimulated by support of the cross-border activity of corporations suited to the Single Market. The dynamic and ever-increasing Single Market requires rational legal forms, models, and institutions to be introduced by the relevant legal instruments. One of these instruments is the Council Regulation (EC) No 2157/2001 (introduced October 8, 2001) on the Statute for a European company. In line with the concept of a legal person to be freed from subjection solely by the national legislation of the Member States, this regulation gives rise to a separate subject of law, the European company (Societas Europaea). Leaving aside the problem of transposition of the European Union rules into the national law of the Member States, this act is drafted to pave the way for the legal certainty in carrying out cross-border corporate activity and its restructuring based on a new legal framework, ensuring continuity of the corporate existence. But has the Council of the European Union given the nationals of the European Union the legal form that was expected and desired? How does the legal status of a European company differ from the one indigenous to a national corporation, composed initially of the very same persons? Are there changes in private international law regulation with respect to the formal enlargement of the definition of a corporation inherent to this legal act? Finally, does the enactment of this Council Regulation mean that national corporate law was fully discovered and exploited, and that the idea of a national corporation will soon perish? This book provides the answer to these and other issues. [Subject: Private International Law, European Law, EU Law, Corporate Law]