Corporate Disruption: The Law and Design of Organizations in the 21st Century

Abstract

This paper explores the issue of “re-making” corporate law through the prism of the United Nations’ recent efforts at reducing legal obstacles experienced by micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in starting and scaling a business. In order to be successful, we recommend that the UN should go back to business fundamentals and should attempt to build from the ground up based on the real world needs of entrepreneurs, rather than work off already existing corporate legal systems. In this way, it is possible to engage in a more imaginative form of regulatory design in which a clear, open and preferential legal framework for stimulating innovation and business creation can be developed.

Keywords: Company, corporate governance, corporation, entrepreneurship, formal economy, freedom of contract, hybrid business forms, informal economy, micro-finance, organization, theory of the firm, uncorporation, ventures

JEL Classification: D21, F6, G34, K20, K22, L20, L22, L26, O31