Conclusion

Abstract

Chapter 7 concludes that Korean corporate law should not merely abide the diffusion of regulatory corporate social responsibility (CSR) laws throughout other disparate legislative fields, but should ideally seek to actively unify and encode these laws in a systematic manner. To fulfill this task, Korean corporate jurisprudence should first establish a foundational definition regarding Korean corporate law’s formal and unambiguous recognition of CSR and determine how it may be formalized within the country’s legal system for the purpose of CSR implementation. One significant hazard facing Korean corporate law is the heedless and wholesale adoption of the shareholder primacy model of the American tradition. Such action would risk ignoring the vast social harm—both potential and real—caused by abuses of corporate power. Indeed, Korean jurisprudence should clearly establish the fundamentally social nature of the corporation and the attendant responsibility to society as a basic regulatory tenet in order to prevent further and potentially more devastating occurrences of corporate malfeasance in its own society.