What is Corporate Governance? Anglo/American versus German Model

Seminar paper from the year 2003 in the subject Economics - Industrial Economics, grade: 1,50, University of Abertay Dundee (Economics Department), course: Economics of the modern corporation, 12 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: Recently the image of top-managers has been attacked by several cases of massive fraud. To name only some, Enron and WorldCom amongst others are probably the best known ones. In both companies, managers acted impudent shameless and greedily. And this seems to be dreadful not only for shareholders and stakeholders of that particular firm, but also for the entire economy and the societies involved. Based on this, the essay is dealing with questions of corporate governance and its very routes. Therefore, the basic idea and especially its two main (contradicting?!) concepts - the Anglo/American versus the German - will be explained more in detail. Both systems have got deep routes in their respective regions history. And both of them might make some sense in there local backgrounds. Moreover, the models will be contrasted against each other and an evaluation which model could lead to better corporate performance and corporate governance is made.