On 18 December 2002, one of the major legislative projects of the Schröder Government during its first term of office from 1998 to 2002 failed when the Federal Constitutional Court delivered its judgement in the Immigration Act case. In a split decision, the Court declared the new Immigration Act, the “Gesetz zur Steuerung und Begrenzung der Zuwanderung“ (Act on the Management and Limitation of Immigration) void for formal reasons: It found that the Act did not receive a valid majority vote in the Bundesrat, the chamber of the 16 German states (Länder) that form the Republic. The Court did not have to deal with any questions related to the content of the Act. It discussed only the constitutionality of the legislative procedure.

Even experienced scholars will have to think for quite a while when asked to remember whether a similar situation has ever occurred: A tiny constitutional provision in the organisational part of the Grundgesetz (GG – Basic Law), not exactly neglected by learned writers but definitely never seen as a source of major problems, became the starting point of one of the most emotional outbursts German politics has ever experienced. The said provision, Article 51.3(2) of the Basic Law, dealing with the voting procedure in the Bundesrat innocently says that the votes of one Land's representatives “can” (“können”) be cast only unanimously. In order to understand the causes for the earthquake that struck the German political and constitutional system in the 774th session of the Bundesrat on 22 March 2002 it is essential to shed light on the structure and the constitutional role of the Bundesrat.

Formation of a holding SE is one of the four ways of establishing a European Company (societas europaea - ‘SE') as regulated in the Council Regulation No 2157/2001 on the Statute for a European Company (cited below: SE-Reg.). It is also an original way of European company law to create a joint stock company. It's true that companies are making use of the holding structure in order to combine their economic potentials and to create international groups of enterprises. But, as it was in the case of the formation of the Aventis S.A., the holding structures usually come into existence by means of an increase of the subscribed capital in an existing company. The new shares are issued to the shareholders of another company who pay for it with the shares of their company. The operation results in formation of a holding structure in which the company that increased its capital, becomes a holding company dominating a company or companies the shares of which were contributed. The formation of a holding SE is guided by the similar idea: an exchange of the shares of national private or public limited liability companies into the shares of a European Company. However, in contrast to the Aventis like-cases, the dominant company, i.e. the SE, does not exist yet but has to be created by the companies according to the provisions of the SE-Regulation. This fact as well as many legal gaps existing in the scanty regulation of holding formation and the necessity to apply both the provisions of European and national law concomitantly may lead to many legal problems some of which will be presented below.

Rational investment decisions require accurate information regarding the operations and performance of issuers. As the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) has recently noted: “Accurate and reliable financial reporting lies at the heart of our disclosure-based system for securities regulation, and is critical to the integrity of the U.S. securities markets. Investors need accurate and reliable financial information to make informed investment decisions. Investor confidence in the reliability of corporate financial information is fundamental to the liquidity and vibrancy of our markets.” Issuers have strong motives to signal to investors that the business information they disclose is correct and complete – so as to build solid reputations and avoid discounts that investors might apply to their stock prices as compensation for undisclosed risk or misrepresented results. A similar argument applies to “gatekeeping” reputational intermediaries, such as auditing firms and investment banks that lend their reputations to their clients in various ways. However, dishonest issuers and gatekeepers can take advantage of a generally honest market (that does not contain a substantial fraud risk discount), and the return on fraud for a given member of a firm might exceed such individual's pro rata share of the firm's overall reputational capital, making crime literally pay; therefore, regulation must be introduced to supplement market controls and mandate full and accurate disclosure.

Judgement of the CJEC in Case C-491/01, The Queen and the Secretary of State for Health ex parte British American Tobacco (Investments) Ltd and Imperial Tobacco Ltd (Tobacco Manufacturing Directive Case)

The January, 27, 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision, FCC v. NextWave was, on the surface, nothing more than the high court's statutory interpretation of a single provision of the Bankruptcy Code. Deep down, however, NextWave tells an important spectrum management and regulatory story which is relevant in both the U.S. and European contexts. It is the story of a company which paid too much for wireless licenses at auction, and a story about a battle – political as well as legal – between government and industry for retention of the license. This same struggle is presently taking place in Europe in the wake of the 3G auctions. This Article reviews the recent NextWave decision and makes propositions about similarities in the European context.

To introduce Bruno Simma to the readers of German Law Journal is both an easy and a difficult task. An easy one because it will hardly be necessary to introduce his writings to those who have done only the slightest research in public international law– from his textbook “Universelles Völkerrecht” of 1976, co-authored with his teacher and mentor Alfred Verdross and still widely cited in German literature and jurisprudence, to the Commentary of the Charter of the United Nations which he first edited (in German) in 1991, the second English edition of which was published last year by Oxford University Press. On the other hand, writing on Bruno Simma is a difficult task because many of you will already have got a personal impression already – meeting him in Munich, where he has been teaching international and European law for no less than thirty years, in Ann Arbor/Michigan, where he is member of the affiliate overseas faculty of the University of Michigan Law School (since 1997) after teaching there for more than ten years, or at the Academies in The Hague or Florence, where he has taught much-acclaimed and -cited lectures on the move of international law “from bilateralism to community interest” and the relationship between human rights law and general international law. An even broader audience has come to know him for his public appearances in the press, the radio or television, in particular for his characterization of the dilemma of the Kosovo intervention as a “thin red line” between legality and morality. His article on “NATO, the UN and the Use of Force” appeared on the Webpages of the European Journal of International Law – the leading European international law journal he co-founded in 1990 and still co-edits – even before the first shots were fired.

Business disputes, especially those with an international context, are often decided by an arbitral tribunal. As of January 1, 1998, the Federal Republic of Germany has adopted the UNCITRAL Model Law for domestic and international arbitrations taking place in Germany. Consequently, German parties have increasingly chosen arbitration as a means of dispute resolution. Moreover, international parties are also discovering Germany as a suitable place for arbitration. The reason for this trend is not only the acceptance of the well-known and arbitration-friendly Model Law. Germany as the designated place of arbitration compares favourably with its international competitors given its very efficient court system that willingly supports arbitral tribunals, if required. Furthermore, a large number of polyglot German lawyers who are well-versed in the laws of foreign jurisdictions are qualified to conduct arbitral proceedings at a high standard for – compared to their Anglo-Saxon competitors – a relatively low price.