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An Outline of Czech Company Law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2006

Bohumil Havel
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Abstract

Although this paper focuses primarily on Czech company law, it begins with a description of the general legal development of Czech commercial (including company) law. The first part describes the social and historical background of the Czech law after the period of Communism (1948–1989), some defects ensuing from a paradigmatic understanding of law and problems with Czech case law. The paper tries to manifest that it is impossible to understand the Czech concept of (private) company law without a thorough knowledge of the legal thinking of current Czech judges and the relevant authorities. After this broad introduction, a selection of legal literature dealing with commercial and company law is provided.

The second part of the paper provides some general information on Czech company law, mainly its systematic incorporation into Czech private law and the structure of the Czech Commercial Code. The following sections describe each company type (partnership, limited partnership, limited liability company and joint-stock company) and co-operatives, including the European law connotation, supranational entities and their implementation in Czech law (Societas Europaea, European Interest Groupings and the European Co-operative Society). The anticipated future development of Czech private law (civil and commercial law) is sketched at the end of the paper, taking into account the drafts of the new Civil Code and Commercial Act and other new proposals related to private law.

Keywords

Czech company lawhistorylegal literaturesocial backgroundparadigmcase lawcommercial codecivil codepartnershiplimited partnershiplimited liability companyjoint-stock companyco-operativecommercial registryEuropean company lawfuture development of Czech private lawshopping forum
Type
Articles
Information
European Business Organization Law Review (EBOR) , Volume 6 , Issue 4 , December 2005 , pp. 581 - 623
Copyright
T.M.C. Asser Press 2005

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Footnotes

The purpose of this paper is not to provide a scientific study of the details of Czech commercial law – this is in fact impossible after the many years of development in this branch of law. My purpose and effort is only to outline the social and normative framework in which the Czech business community and, in particular, Czech companies exist and function, and to refer to the key relevant sources. It remains a fact that the Czech law’s normativity involves numerous problems and that since 1991 many papers have been written and plenty of books and articles have been published, trying to address those problems. However, a list of all of them would take up half the space of this paper and would still remain far from complete. I believe there is no space and no reason to include such a list here.