University of Georgia School of Law Professor Christopher Bruner presented the keynote address for a symposium titled “Sustainability is (Still) Possible! Governing Market Actors for a Safe and Just Space” at the University of Turin (Italy) in September. Bruner’s keynote was titled “Corporate Sustainability and Anti-ESG Backlash” and the symposium was co-sponsored by Turin’s Department of Law and Department of Economics and Statistics.
Bruner is the Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law at the University of Georgia School of Law and serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center.
This paper provides an in-depth insight into Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) reporting in Nigeria, Africa’s largest economy. The Adoption Readiness Working Group’s proposed implementation of the Sustainability Reporting in Nigeria would mandate ESG reporting. This paper also contrasts Nigeria’s reporting standards and regulations with those of other African nations, including Ghana, South Africa, and Egypt. It aims to provide a better understanding of ESG reporting in Africa, which would help investors and partners intending to invest in Africa.
University of Georgia School of Law professor Christopher M. Bruner presented “A Political Economy of Corporate Sustainability Reform in the United States” at an online event hosted by the University of Oslo Faculty of Law in October. The event was organized by Oslo’s Sustainability Law research group and convened by Professor Beate Sjåfjell.
Below is an abstract of the presentation:
Conservative backlash against sustainability initiatives and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investment policies has been particularly intense in the United States – to the point that these issues have become mired in the broader ‘culture wars’ that increasingly characterize American public life and permeate policymaking. Today, initiatives styled as corporate sustainability or ESG are often rejected outright by conservative federal and state actors opposed to intrusion of what they regard as ‘woke’ progressive policies into economic law. In response, A Political Economy of Corporate Sustainability Reform in the United States tackles two related challenges in the US context – (1) how to advance first-best corporate governance reforms in the long-term, and (2) how to advance second-best alternatives in the near-term.
Christopher M. Bruner is the Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law at the University of Georgia School of Law and serves as a faculty co-director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center.
As posted previously, speakers representing a diverse range of doctrinal, institutional, and jurisdictional perspectives gathered on October 16 to discuss the array of contemporary ESG and corporate sustainability initiatives, mapping this rapidly evolving global landscape and engaging with the host of complex international and comparative legal challenges they raise.
Keynoting the conference was University of Pennsylvania Carey School of Law Professor Jill E. Fisch, Saul A. Fox Distinguished Professor of Business Law; Co-Director, Institute for Law & Economics.
The video links are as follows:
Introduction and Panel 1: ESG and Sustainable Finance, with Usha Rodrigues, University Professor and M.E. Kilpatrick Chair of Corporate Finance and Securities Law, University of Georgia School of Law; George S. Georgiev, Associate Professor of Law, Emory University School of Law; Virginia Harper Ho, Professor of Law, City University of Hong Kong; Stephen Park, Associate Professor of Business Law and Satell Fellow in Corporate Social Responsibility, University of Connecticut School of Business; and Anne Tucker, Professor of Law, Georgia State University College of Law.
Panel 2: Corporate Law, Corporate Governance and Sustainability, with Christopher M. Bruner, Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, University of Georgia School of Law; Matthew T. Bodie, Robins Kaplan Professor of Law, University of Minnesota Law School; Andrew Johnston, Professor of Company Law and Corporate Governance, University of Warwick School of Law; Lindsay Sain Jones, Assistant Professor, University of Georgia Terry College of Business; and Omari Scott Simmons, Professor of Law, George Washington University Law School.
Panel 3: Multinational Corporations and Global Value Chains, with Harlan G. Cohen, Gabriel M. Wilner/UGA Foundation Professor in International Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, University of Georgia School of Law (and the GJICL’s Faculty Advisor); Sarah Dadush, Professor of Law, Rutgers Law School; David Hess, Professor of Business Law and Business Ethics, University of Michigan Stephen M. Ross School of Business; Kish Parella, Class of 1960 Professor of Ethics and Law, Washington and Lee University School of Law; and Jaakko Salminen, Associate Senior Lecturer, Department of Law, Lund University.
Keynote Addressby Jill E. Fisch, Saul A. Fox Distinguished Professor of Business Law and Co-Director of the Institute for Law and Economics, University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School
This event was cosponsored by the Dean Rusk International Law Center.
This year’s annual conference of the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law will address “ESG and Corporate Sustainability: Global Perspectives on Regulatory Reform.” Featured will be a keynote discussion by Jill E. Fisch, the Saul A. Fox Distinguished Professor of Business Law and Co-Director of the Institute for Law and Economics at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, as well as panels including more than a dozen experts from around the world.
The daylong conference will take place on Monday, October 16, in the Larry Walker Room of Dean Rusk Hall at the University of Georgia School of Law.
Sponsoring along with GJICL, a student-edited journal established more than 50 years ago, is the law school’s Dean Rusk International Law Center. GJICL Editor in Chief, 3L Jack Schlafly, worked with Professor Christopher M. Bruner, who is the Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law and a newly appointed Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center; Center staff Sarah Quinn, Interim Director; Catrina Martin, Global Practice Preparation Assistant; and with the GJICL’s Faculty Advisor, Professor Harlan Grant Cohen, who is Gabriel M. Wilner/UGA Foundation Professor in International Law and one of the Center’s Faculty Co-Directors.
Below is the concept note of the conference:
We live in an era marked by complex and interconnected environmental, social, and economic crises, including climate change and various forms of destabilizing inequalities. Efforts to grapple with these realities are rapidly evolving and taking shape through a host of private and public institutions, both domestically and internationally, and an array of novel reform efforts aim to curb harmful corporate practices that have contributed to such crises.
Global asset managers have increasingly prioritized “environmental, social, and governance” (ESG) factors – emphasizing their relation to investment risk and investment return – and have taken up existing tools available to them through corporate law, securities regulation, and capital market structures to push for change. Meanwhile, various types of domestic regulatory reforms have been adopted, or are under consideration, in jurisdictions around the world to promote “corporate sustainability,” understood to include environmental, social, and economic dimensions. Some reform initiatives focus on disclosure, reflecting confidence that investors, consumers, and other constituencies armed with sufficient information could differentiate between sustainable and unsustainable companies, and that these private actors would effectively reward the former and punish the latter. Other reform initiatives take more direct aim at decision-making incentives of managers and investors alike, through corporate governance structures creating novel – and potentially powerful – liability regimes intended to force both domestic and multinational businesses to internalize costs that would otherwise be externalized to society and the environment. At the same time, a host of international organizations have sought to promote ESG and corporate sustainability through a range of global standard-setting and coordination efforts.
This symposium will grapple with the array of ESG and corporate sustainability initiatives taking shape today, mapping this rapidly evolving global landscape and engaging with the host of complex international and comparative legal challenges they raise. Speakers offering a diverse range of doctrinal, institutional, and jurisdictional perspectives will tackle these issues through presentations and panel discussions focusing on capital market developments, corporate governance reform initiatives, and efforts to constrain multinational businesses.
The day’s events are as follows:
9:00-9:15am | Welcome Messages
Peter B. “Bo” Rutledge, Dean and Talmadge Chair of Law, University of Georgia School of Law
Sarah Quinn, Interim Director, Dean Rusk International Law Center
9:15-10:30am | Panel 1: ESG and Sustainable Finance
George S. Georgiev, Associate Professor of Law, Emory University School of Law
Virginia Harper Ho, Professor of Law, City University of Hong Kong (Zoom)
Stephen Park, Associate Professor of Business Law and Satell Fellow in Corporate Social Responsibility, University of Connecticut School of Business
Anne Tucker, Professor of Law, Georgia State University College of Law
Moderator: Usha Rodrigues, University Professor and M.E. Kilpatrick Chair of Corporate Finance and Securities Law, University of Georgia School of Law
10:30-10:45am | Break
10:45-12:00pm | Panel 2: Corporate Law, Corporate Governance and Sustainability
Matthew T. Bodie, Robins Kaplan Professor of Law, University of Minnesota Law School
Andrew Johnston, Professor of Company Law and Corporate Governance, University of Warwick School of Law (UK) (Zoom)
Lindsay Sain Jones, Assistant Professor, University of Georgia Terry College of Business
Omari Scott Simmons, Professor of Law, George Washington University Law School
Moderator: Christopher M. Bruner, Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, University of Georgia School of Law
12:00-1:00pm | Lunch
1:00-2:15pm | Panel 3: Multinational Corporations and Global Value Chains
Sarah Dadush, Professor of Law, Rutgers Law School (Zoom)
David Hess, Professor of Business Law and Business Ethics, University of Michigan Stephen M. Ross School of Business
Kish Parella, Class of 1960 Professor of Ethics and Law, Washington and Lee University School of Law (Zoom)
Jaakko Salminen, Associate Senior Lecturer, Department of Law, Lund University (Sweden) (Zoom)
Moderator: Harlan G. Cohen, Gabriel M. Wilner/UGA Foundation Professor in International Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, University of Georgia School of Law
2:15-2:30pm | Break
2:30-2:35pm | Keynote Introduction
Christopher M. Bruner, Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, University of Georgia School of Law
2:35-3:15pm | Keynote Address
Jill E. Fisch, Saul A. Fox Distinguished Professor of Business Law and Co-Director of the Institute for Law and Economics, University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School
3:15 | Closing Remarks
Jack Schlafly, Editor in Chief, Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law
exchange of notes 