CEL - Enterprise Law and the Public Good

Enterprise law is key for the ‘desperate need to understand our world’s central problems, their causes and the options our laws present to solve them.’ This is taken from the Afterword of Dr Ewan McGaughey’s new book Principles of Enterprise Law published by the Cambridge University Press. Dr McGaughey advocates a broad perspective of what constitutes enterprise law, as such a perspective puts us in a better position to regulate corporate behaviour, economic relations, production and distributive issues, compared to adherence to a narrowly-framed ‘law and economics’ model of the corporation or the firm.

This event is centred on Dr McGaughey’s new book and its key messages, which are highly relevant in this age of sustainability challenges and persistent social and economic inequalities, which remain slow to be addressed in many democratic capitalist societies including the UK. How should we reconceive of enterprise law so that private economic activities contribute not just to private wealth creation but also to public good?

Dr McGaughey will make a keynote address at the event, and the Centre has invited a panel of eminent commentators from academia and industry to provide their reflections. We look forward to engaging all concerned stakeholders in these discussions.

Dr Ewan McGaughey is a Reader who specialises in law, economics and history. He joined King's full time in 2014, after completing a PhD at the London School of Economics (LSE), and working on part-time, fixed-term contracts since 2008 at King's, the LSE and UCL. He holds degrees from King’s, the Humboldt Universität zu Berlin and the LSE.

Ewan is also a research associate at the University of Cambridge, Centre for Business Research; teaches each year at the Paris School of Economics; and is a volunteer for the Free Representation Unit. He has held visiting positions at the University of California, Berkeley in 2016, Fukuoka University in 2017, the University of Sydney in 2019, and Vanderbilt University in 2023.

Professor Elizabeth Pollman, Carey Law School, University of Pennsylvania

Elizabeth Pollman is Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. She teaches and writes in the areas of corporate law and governance, as well as startups, venture capital, and entrepreneurship. Her articles have been selected by scholars in the field in an annual survey as among the Top Ten Best Corporate and Securities Articles five times, most recently in 2021 for “The Corporate Governance Machine” (Columbia Law Review, co-authored with Dorothy S. Lund). She serves as a co-director of the Institute for Law & Economics at Penn Law. In addition, she serves on the Corporate Laws Committee of the American Bar Association and is a research member of the European Corporate Governance Institute. She has received the Harvey Levin Memorial Award for Teaching Excellence (2022) and the LLM Prize for Excellence in Teaching (2021). She practiced law at Latham & Watkins in Silicon Valley and Los Angeles and served as a clerk for Judge Raymond C. Fisher of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. She earned both her BA and JD, with distinction, from Stanford University.

Professor Karsten Engsig Sørensen, University of Aarhus

Karsten Engsig Sørensen is a Professor at the Department of Law, Aarhus University, Denmark. He holds a Danish law degree, an LLM (from Exeter), a PhD (on EU Company Law), and a Danish Dr. Jur. (on joint ventures). His research is mainly focused on EU Law and Company Law, and within these areas he has published several books and articles in both Danish and English. Much of his research has focused on EU company law. He is one of the two editors of the SSRN-series Nordic and European Company Law. One of his most recent publications is the book Instruments of EU Corporate Governance: Effecting Change in the Management of Companies in a Changing World, Wolters Kluwer, which he has co-edited and contributed to with a chapter on managerial procedural rules.

Professor Barnali Choudhury, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University

Professor Choudhury is a Professor of Law and the Director of the Jack & Mae Nathanson Centre on Transnational Human Rights, Crime and Security. Prior to joining Osgoode, she was a Professor at University College London and academic director of UCL’s Global Governance Institute.

She is an internationally recognized expert on business and international economic issues, particularly as they relate to issues of human rights. She has published numerous books, including Corporate Duties to the Public (Cambridge University Press, 2019); Understanding the Company: Corporate Governance and Theory (Cambridge University Press, 2017); and Public Services and International Trade Liberalization: Human Rights and Gender Implications (Cambridge University Press, 2012), as well as a forthcoming commentary on the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

She is regularly invited to give talks and has presented her work throughout Asia, Europe, the Middle East, North America and at the United Nations. She has visited at New York University, University of Cambridge, University of St. Gallen, University of Otago, and at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and Private Law. In addition to numerous academic citations, her work has been cited by the United Nations, the UK’s House of Commons, the House of Lords EU Select Committee, international arbitral tribunals and relied on by governments and international non-governmental organizations.

Gerald Brown, Novaquest Capital Management and QHP

Gerry Brown is Chairman of Novaquest Capital Management and of QHP, global Private Equity firms focussed on Life Sciences with over $4bn under management and of G Brown Associates Ltd a family company providing consultancy services. He has enjoyed a diverse career as Independent Chairman /Director of 11 different companies. These board positions were at public private equity and privately owned businesses across a wide range of international business in different sectors including life sciences ,ports, property, logistics, IT hardware and software and financial services in UK, USA, Europe, Africa and Asia.

Prior to this he was an international senior business executive director working in supply chain management including Operations Director of Exel plc (now DHL), Board Director of TDG and Chairman of Europe for Tibbett&Britten. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and of the Institute of Directors and Visiting Fellow of Henley Business School

He has been a Council Member and Chair of Audit at the University of Exeter and chairs the Fundraising Board. He is a business book author and speaker ,his books include The Independent Director, The Independent Director in Society, Making a Difference and Board Disasters. He is a Board Member of the Advisory Council on Governance of the IOD. He has funded research into governance in government, The NHS, Universities, Charities, Sport and is a supporter of the Leadership Institute at London Business School.

About the Centre: UCL's Centre for Ethics and Law promotes and enhances collaboration between corporates, practitioners, civil servants, academics and others around the broad themes of professional ethics and the ethics of risk. Read more about the group and its work.

Image by Bárbara Cascão from Pixabay

Host or Publisher UCL Laws