Should insolvent companies be rescued for the benefit of stakeholders such as employees, suppliers, local industry and local livelihoods? Or in the alternative should the insolvent company be allowed to wither and die through liquidation as part of what Schumpeter has called ‘Gales of Creative Destruction” of capitalism? In short, should we prioritise creditors or community with our corporate rescue and insolvency laws?
The ‘Corporate Rescue and Insolvency’ LLM module critically examines the legal rules, policy, and theoretical underpinnings that exist to deal with insolvent companies through a lens of corporate rescue.
The corporate rescue regimes (administration, company voluntary arrangements (CVAs), moratoriums, Part26A restructuring, schemes of arrangement) that facilitate rescue of the company are critically examined in the module. The focus of the module is on rescue as opposed to terminal procedures such as liquidation and striking off.
The rescue culture is examined from a theoretical perspective. We examine the main international theories of corporate rescue and restructuring (e.g. Jackson, Warren, Korobkin, Gross) to place corporate rescue in theoretical context. There is a strong focus on bankruptcy communitarianism in the module to reflect the idea that an insolvency law should exist for the benefit of numerous stakeholders, not just creditors. This approach engenders our social justice activity as a law department.
Students will leave the module with a thorough theoretical and policy grasp of corporate rescue.