사회적 가치의 회사법적 수용방안 -계몽적 주주가치 개념을 중심으로-

Given the increasing social needs to ask a corporation for embodying the social values into its corporate activities, this paper explores the possibilities to introduce the social values into corporate law. To challenge the argument that corporate law should be neutral to political or social value judgement, this paper firstly explores ethical or moral philosophies such as free-market fundamentalistic liberalism, equalitarianistic liberalism, and communitarianism, then deals with firm theories such as the two quite different contractarianisms, shareholder primacy theory and stakeholder theory, and communitarianism, which are all based on the above philosophies in order respectively. In chapter 3 and 4, this paper examines and diagnoses the two primary corporate law theories, shareholder value approach and stakeholder approach, focusing on the acceptability of social values into corporate law and business activities. In chapter 5, this paper reviews ‘Enlightened Shareholder Value’(ESV) as the third way and examines subsection 172(1) of the British Companies Act 2006 to propose a sort of exemplary plan to embody social values into corporate law, and analyses the limitations of ESV to find out a scheme reflecting social needs better. In conclusion, this research argues that ESV approach is a soft strategy to materialize sustainable development agendas in corporate law as it does not modify the fundamentals of the present corporate law base on shareholder value approach and it is a practical and realistic plan to be introduced in Korean company law.