[Editors’ Note: Prof. Brugger's article will appear in German Law Journal in two parts, the first in this month's issue and the second in Vol. 4, No. 1 (1 January 2003). The article originally appeared in Stocktaking in German Public Law 117 (Bullinger and Starck eds., 2002). It is republished here with the kind permission of NOMOS Verlag, Baden-Baden.]

As pointed out by the Federal Constitutional Court, a specific determination of the appropriateness of hate speech prohibitions can be based only on the circumstances of individual cases. Some particularly prominent cases are now reviewed.

The term corporate governance has come to mean many things to many people. One important reason is that views continue differ as to the fundamental question of the role the firm. While some believe that corporations can contribute best to society if they do what they do best, namely to provide high quality goods and services to the marketplace, for others corporate responsibilities are much broader.

[Editors’ Comment: The following is the text of Mr. Kenny's remarks at the Second European Corporate Governance Conference, which was organized by the Vlerick Management Institute and the University of Gent, Belgium, and held at the Belgian National Bank, Brussels, 28 & 29 November 2002. The conference, which was convened by Professor Lutgart Van den Berghe of the University of Gent, was dedicated to the intensive debate over the marks and characteristics of “European Capitalism” in light of the international corporate governance debate, which has been affected by the recent earthquakes in the confidence of investors, shareholders and stakeholders precipitated by the corporate scandals of Enron, Worldcom, Global Crossing and others. The conference also took note of the impact of America's new Sarbanes-Oxley legislation, which seeks to respond to the wave of corporate scandals, on the international corporate governance debate.