Contract today increasingly links entrepreneurial innovations to the efforts and finance necessary to transform ideas into value. In this Chapter, we describe the match between a form of contract that "braids" formal and informal contractual elements in novel ways and the process by which...

Research on the law and economics of contract typically analyzes the explicit pricing of the contract terms in a debt contract by modeling a bilateral debtor-creditor relationship, a framework we call the “classical model.” Under this model, contract terms that affect the debtor's repayment...

The rise of the network as a form of economic organization renders problematic our standard understanding of how capitalism is governed. As the governance of production shifts from vertical integration to horizontal contract, a puzzle arises: how do contracts, presumed to be susceptible to...

When investments are non-verifiable, inducing cooperative investments with simple contracts may not be as difficult as previously thought. Indeed, modeling “expectation damages” close to legal practice, we show that the commonly applied remedy of US contract law induces the first best. Yet,...

This paper argues that while financial markets have become transnational, their governance structures have remained national at the core: Fiscal responsibility for crises is ultimately born by the nation state where the crisis occurred – whether or not it bears any responsibility for...

Over half of all small businesses reorganizing under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code are ultimately liquidated. Little is known about this shutdown decision and about the factors that increase or reduce the amount of time a firm spends in bankruptcy. It is widely suspected, however, that...

Structural reform, the “third arrow” of the Abe administration's policy for revitalizing the Japanese economy, centers on corporate governance reform. In recent years, Japan has adopted a Stewardship Code in the hopes of invigorating institutional investor engagement, a Corporate Governance...

We develop a model of a firm in financial distress. Distress can be mitigated by filing for bankruptcy, which is costly, or preempted by restructuring, which is impeded by a collective action problem. We find that bankruptcy and restructuring are complements, not substitutes: Reducing bankruptcy...

Shareholder and public dissatisfaction with executive compensation has led to calls for an annual shareholder advisory vote on a firm's compensation pratices and policies, so-called "say on pay." Proposed federal legislation would mandate "say on pay" generally for US public companies. This...