Decoding the Rights of Companies in the Technocene

In this book, legal scholars from a range of disciplines examine the private commercial corporation as a bearer of rights and as the central actor in the global transformations that constitute the Technocene: a geological epoch brought about not by the actions of humans, individually or collectively, but by technological agency.

Central to this agency is the modern company: a form of legal technology that has made possible the emergence of entities with their own interests and objectives, which are able to operate with a considerable degree of autonomy from the human beings that create them and that work within them. A key element in the construction of this legal technology has been the ascription of rights – by claiming rights, companies get not only legal standing but also political and moral legitimacy. It is in this role, as a bearer of rights, that the company most closely mirrors the human legal subject.

This volume is the first sustained, dedicated intervention to examine the private commercial corporation as a bearer of rights, and as a central actor in the global transformations that constitute the Technocene. It will be an indispensable resource for students and scholars of corporate law, human rights law and transnational law. The chapters were first published as a special issue of Transnational Legal Theory.