法律翻译｜牛津法律与经济学手册：私法和商法

译者 | 马   原 华东理工大学

一审 | 戚若音UCB LLM

二审 | 王槐语上海交通大学

编辑 | 王冰子 烟台大学

Abstract: This chapter examines the nature and structure of corporate entities (a category that includes business corporations, nonprofits, and many limited-liability companies). It discusses the basic characteristics of corporate entities, surveys different models or theories of the corporation, and explores the question of corporate purpose. It pays special attention to how corporate law allocates economic and control rights to, and among, both the corporate entity itself and the natural persons involved with corporations, such as shareholders, directors, and executive officers. The chapter finds that there is widespread agreement about the basic legal characteristics of corporate entities: legal personhood, limited liability, delegated management, transferable shares (for stock corporations), and perpetual existence. However, when it comes to models of the corporate entity and to the normative question of proper corporate purpose, there is great diversity and a fair degree of disagreement.

摘要：本章探讨了法人实体（包括商业法人、非营利组织和众多有限责任公司）的性质与结构，分析了法人实体的基本特性，研究了公司的不同模型或理论，并探讨了公司目标的问题。本章重点关注了公司法如何在法人实体本身与其涉及的自然人（如股东、董事及管理决策层）之间分配经济权与控制权。文章发现人们对法人实体的基本法律属性，如法人身份、有限责任、委托管理、股份公司的可转让股份以及永久存续等性质形成了广泛的共识。然而，在法人实体的理论模型，对公司目标的规制等问题上，人们的认识存在显著的多样性和较大的分歧。

Keywords: corporations, corporate entities, corporate law, corporate structure, corporate purpose

关键词：公司、法人实体、公司法、公司结构、公司目标

Abstract: Corporations operate in numerous markets, for example product markets, labor markets, and capital markets. This chapter focuses on the market that is the prerequisite for firms’ successful operation in all other markets, as it is the market that frames their organizational structure and governance: the market for corporate law. The first part analyzes the dynamics of the US market for corporate law, which can best be characterized as states competing for corporate charters, along with data pertinent to the question of whom this market organization benefits—managers or shareholders and explanations why Delaware has had a persistent and commanding position. The second part explains Delaware’s persistence as the preeminent incorporation state. This is a distinctive feature of US corporate law. While there are other federal systems of corporate law, a similar “Delaware” phenomenon does not exist. The chapter concludes with a summary and suggestions for future research.

摘要：公司在诸如产品市场、劳动力市场和资本市场等众多市场中运作。本章聚焦于对公司在所有其他市场中的成功运营至关重要的市场——公司法市场，也即塑造公司组织架构和治理框架的市场。文章第一部分首先分析了美国公司法市场的动态，该市场以各州在公司章程领域的竞争为主要特征，并结合相关数据探讨了市场结构对管理层还是股东有利，以及特拉华州在美国公司法市场能长期占据主导地位的原因。其次，文章第二部分解释了特拉华州为何能持久成为首选注册州。这也是美国公司法的一个独特特征，而类似的“特拉华现象”在其他的联邦公司法体系中并不存在。文章以总结和对未来研究的建议作为结语。

Keywords: corporate law, corporations, Delaware, incorporation state, US law

关键词：公司法、公司、特拉华州、注册州、美国法律

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Abstract: This chapter attempts to explain how agency and partnership bridge the gap between contract and the firm. Both agency and partnership facilitate contracting, the first by enabling contractual intermediation and the second by enabling the pooling of resources in the joint pursuit of an enterprise. The main concern of agency and partnership law, however, is to address the problems caused by moving from the two-party contractual relations to three-party relationships, which creates the potential for any two parties to collude against the interests of the third. Partnership differs from agency in that it involves multiple owners who have the right and ability to exercise control over shared partnership property. That fact creates a need for partnership law to address additional collusive possibilities involving partners, whether acting on behalf of the partnership in dealing with third parties or acting against the interest of the partnership by misappropriating the partnership property.

摘要：本章旨在解释代理和合伙如何弥合合同与企业之间的鸿沟。代理和合伙都有助于合同的订立，前者通过提供合同的中介服务来实现，后者则通过资源的共享，在共同追求企业目标上发挥作用。然而，代理与合伙法主要关心的问题是解决由双方合同关系向三方关系转变引发的问题，在此转变过程中可能出现由任意两方联合损害第三方的利益的现象。合伙与代理的区别在于，合伙关系涉及多个所有者，这些所有者有权利和能力对共有的合伙财产进行控制。因此这种情况要求合伙法额外考虑到合伙人之间可能出现的勾结行为，不论是他们代表合伙企业处理与第三方的事务时，还是通过非法占用合伙企业财产而损害企业利益时。

Keywords: law of agency, general partnership, partnership law, contracting, contract

关键词：代理法、普通合伙、合伙法、合约订立、合同

Abstract: This chapter focuses on the universal principles of banking and financial regulation. Banking and financial regulation is needed to protect the financial system, which provides functions essential to economic development. Traditionally, financial regulation focused on banking because banks historically have aggregated moneys (primarily by taking deposits from customers) and then allocated those monies (by making loans to borrowers). Traditional financial regulation is geared toward ensuring that deposit-taking banks can continue to perform these functions efficiently. In recent years, however, shadow banking has begun to overtake traditional banking. Financial regulation has two overall goals: to ensure that the components of the financial system—firms and markets—can efficiently perform their underlying economic functions, and to ensure the financial system’s ability to itself function as a network within which those components can operate.

摘要：本章聚焦于银行和金融监管的普遍原则。银行与金融监管的目的在于维护金融系统的稳定，而金融系统对于经济发展来说至关重要。传统金融监管主要关注银行业，因为银行自始便主要通过接受客户存款来聚集资金，然后通过向借款人放贷来分配这些资金。传统金融监管旨在确保接受存款的银行能够继续高效地执行这些功能。然而近年来，影子银行开始超越传统银行。金融监管有两个主要目标：一方面是确保企业和市场作为金融系统的组成部分能够高效地执行其基础经济功能，另一方面是确保金融系统自身有能力作为一个链接网络发挥作用，使得各组成部分在其中能够有效地运行。

Keywords: banking, financial regulation, banking regulation, financial system, financial policy

关键词：银行、金融监管、银行监管、金融系统、金融政策

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Abstract: This chapter presents a review bankruptcy law. It examines whether and when the law encourages debtors and creditors to behave economically efficient ways, both before and after they are in financial distress. It also considers how bankruptcy law could be changed to improve economic efficiency. The discussion abstracts from individual countries’ bankruptcy laws in order to focus on common features of bankruptcy. However, because much of the literature on economic effects of bankruptcy law is US-based, the discussion often focuses on US bankruptcy law in particular. The chapter first examines corporate bankruptcy and then turns to personal and small business bankruptcy.

摘要：本章回顾了破产法，探讨了无论是在财务困境之前还是之后，法律在何种情形下能够鼓励债务人和债权人以经济高效的方式行动，同时分析了如何修改破产法以提高经济效率。讨论对各个国家具体的破产法进行了抽象的提取，侧重于破产的共同特征。但鉴于有关破产法之经济影响的大部分文献植根于美国的情况，分析通常特别关注美国破产法。文章首先检视了公司的破产，然后转向对个人和小型企业破产情形的讨论。

Keywords: bankruptcy law, debtors, creditors, economic efficiency, corporate bankruptcy, personal bankruptcy, business bankruptcy, financial regulation

关键词：破产法、债务人、债权人、经济效率、公司破产、个人破产、企业破产、金融监管

Abstract: This chapter broadly defines the law and economics of insurance. An overview of both economically oriented legal scholarship and traditional economics scholarship is provided. This vantage point reveals the centrality of certain core economic concepts to insurance law and regulation. Moreover, it suggests ways to improve the law by embracing sophisticated understandings of the economics of information asymmetries. For instance, insurance law and regulation assume that adverse selection and moral hazard are important problems in all insurance markets; however, the phenomena come in varying degrees. Thus, their magnitude is an empirical question. An equally significant lacuna in much insurance law is the absence of an equilibrium approach that anticipates insurance market reactions to legal interventions. Similarly, the specific insights of behavioral economics to understand anomalies in insurance demand and how the law might respond are emerging. The law and economics of insurance is still ripe for development.

摘要：本章广泛界定了保险的法律与经济学的定义，概述了以经济学为导向的法学研究和传统经济学研究内容。这一视角突出了某些核心经济学概念在保险法律与监管中的核心地位，并提出通过深入理解信息不对称的经济学理论来改进法律的方法。例如，保险法律与监管认为逆向选择和道德风险在所有保险市场中均为重要问题，但这些现象体现的程度各不相同，因此对其重要性的判断是一个经验问题。许多保险法中都存在一个显著的不足，即缺乏一种均衡的方法来预测保险市场对法律干预的反应。同样地，利用行为经济学的特定观点来理解保险需求的异常以及法律上可能的响应策略正在成为一个新兴领域。保险中的法律与经济学仍有待进一步发展。

Keywords: insurance regulation, insurance law, insurance legislation, economics scholarship, legal scholarship

关键词：保险监管、保险法、保险立法、经济学研究、法学研究

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Abstract: This chapter begins with a brief general overview of the economics of environmental law. It then focuses on recent developments in the field of environmental law and economics, with an emphasis on the experience of the United States. When setting environmental policy, decision makers must address two general types of questions. The first concerns the ends of environmental policy, and examines the socially desirable level of environmental quality. The second type of question concerns the means of policy making and focuses on the types of regulatory instruments that will be used and the allocation of responsibility between governmental actors. Section 2 addresses the first type of question concerning the goals of environmental policy. Sections 3 and 4 address the means of environmental policy, focusing on instrument choice and jurisdictional allocation, respectively.

Keywords: economics, environmental law, environmental policy, instrument choice, jurisdiction

关键词：经济学、环境法、环境政策、工具选择、管辖权