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The relationship between business strategies and legal institutions is important for understanding the historical dynamics of modern capitalism. While legal history and economic history have remained distinct disciplines, a growing number of studies now populates a vibrant «borderland» between the two. Building on frameworks of legal history, organization studies, and «new entrepreneurial history», our contribution systematizes the relation of entrepreneurship and the law from a historical perspective of change. This paper explains how an analysis of this specific relation contributes to our understanding of economic change and addresses the question of synthesis and interdisciplinary connectivity by offering a conceptual triad that focuses on the problems of agency and change at the intersection of businesses and the law. This paper argues that economic actors have used, sought, and avoided laws to transform their legal and economic environments. Each of these interactions combined a distinct set of variables conceptualized as legal business creativity, legal-institutional entrepreneurship, and Schumpeterian rule-breaking.

Summary The essay deals with central problems of scientific publications, especially in the field of digital databases, and deals with current legislative initiatives for the use of works in research and teaching.

Legal and global historical research, especially about the German Empire, has identified an increasing tendency to internationalize the rule making of economic and technical contexts. Also the inte...

What is the relation between businesses and the law? Although few would doubt that firms are acting in tightly regulated legal environments, and have done so for decades, no consensus has emerged o...

The «Carl-Zeiss-Foundation» had a significant influence on the development of the law of business foundations in the Federal Republic of Germany after 1945. Founded by Ernst Abbe in 1889, the Foundation was created to manage two firms driven by a statute in a self-regulated governance exclusively. After World War II such kind of business foundations became part of the German corporated landscape, especially after the 1960s. Critizised by a leading group of ordoliberal lawyers and also in the focus of the legislator, the «Carl-Zeiss-Foundation» was seen as a successful «model-firm», which immunized the law of business foundations against further regulations. The article describes the significant influences of this «model-firm» in the making of policies and the non-making of legal rules.

The paper focuses on the forming of expectations by regulatory authorities in the case of merger control after 1973, when the German legislator stipulated a decision by its officials on future competition in relevant markets. The regulatory and decision-making behavior of officials is analyzed on the basis of selected merger procedures in the chemical industry, which underwent far-reaching structural change in the 1970s and 1980s. Here, institutionalization processes for overcoming information asymmetries and the formation of market expectations can be diagnosed inside the office as well as inside the firms. Adaptive expectations with regard to current market diagnoses and legal assumptions (“Vermutungstatbestände”) play a significant role for their forecast decisions. The study is based on previously unpublished files of the Federal Cartel Office.

Mit dem Ausbruch der Finanzkrise 2008 haben viele eine Starkung der staatlichen Krisenpravention durch einen Ausbau und eine Verscharfung der bestehenden Bankenaufsicht gefordert. Der Gesetzgeber ist dieser Forderung an verschiedenen Stellen seit 2009 nachgekommen. Das wirft die generelle Frage nach der praventiven Wirkung und der Effizienz aufsichtsrechtlicher Regelungen in diesem Bereich auf. Der folgende Beitrag lenkt den Blick auf die Bewaltigung vergangener Bankenkrisen und versucht aus rechtshistorischer Perspektive eine Antwort zu geben.

Many small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs) that specialise in electrical or communications engineering are challenged by the increasing importance of software in their products. Although they have a strong interest in subcontracting competent partners for software development tasks, they tend to refrain from doing so. In this paper we identify three main reasons for this situation, propose an approach to overcome some of them and state remaining challenges. Those reasons are situated in the intersection of software engineering and jurisprudence and therefore need to be addressed in an integrated and multidisciplinary fashion.

Gewerbliche Schutzrechte wie Patente und Gebrauchsmuster sind vermogenswerte Wirtschaftsguter, uber die der Inhaber beschrankt oder unbeschrankt verfugen kann (vgl. § 15 Abs. 1 PatG, § 22 Abs. 1 S. 2 GebrMG i. V. m. § 11 HalblSchG, § 11 SortSchG). Sie gehen auf die Erben uber und konnen Gegenstand vertraglicher Vereinbarungen oder gerichtlicher Feststellungen sein. Der Inhaber kann das Verfugungsobjekt damit vollstandig auf einen anderen ubertragen (Rn. 3 ff.), als Kreditsicherheit verwenden oder auch durch die Einraumung besonderer Rechte eine entgeltliche Nutzung, insbesondere durch Lizenzvereinbarungen (vgl. § 15 Abs. 2, Abs. 3 PatG, § 22 Abs. 2, Abs. 3 GebrMG, § 11 HalblSchG, § 11 SortenSchG), durch andere ermoglichen (Rn. 40 ff.).

Erfindungen an Hochschulen und Forschungseinrichtungen konnen in einem untechnischen Sinne je nach der angesiedelten Fachdisziplin auf den unterschiedlichsten Gebieten der Forschung gemacht werden. Fur den rechtlichen Schutz der gewonnenen Erkenntnisse sind je nach Inhalt und Qualitat der Innovation unterschiedliche gesetzliche Regelungen, ob national oder international zu beachten. Von daher ist es fur forschende Institutionen wichtig, schon in der Entwicklungsphase die rechtlichen Rahmenbedingungen im Auge zu behalten, um einen angemessenen und effizienten Schutz zu erzielen. Der Gesetzgeber stellt schon fur technische Innovationen eine ganze Reihe moglicher Schutzrechte zur Verfugung, von denen das Patent- (Rn. 2 ff.) und Gebrauchsmusterrecht (Rn. 87 ff.) sicher den hochsten wirtschaftlichen Stellenwert einnehmen; dreidimensionale Strukturen von mikroelektronischen Halbleitererzeugnissen (sog. Topographien) konnen zudem Halbleiterschutz erlangen (Rn. 98 ff.). Im Bereich der Pflanzenforschung ermoglicht das SortenSchG die Registrierung besonderer Pflanzenarten. Das Urheberrecht bietet daruber hinaus erganzende oder konkurrierende Schutzmoglichkeiten wissenschaftlicher oder technisch bedingter Innovationen. Abgesehen von den registrierten oder gesetzlich normierten Ausschlieslichkeitsrechten kann schlieslich das sog. Know-how einen eingeschrankten Schutz individuell begrenzten Wissens ohne gleichzeitige Offenlegung gewahren.