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영어

Article 33 in Chinese Corporation law keeps silent on whether shareholders are entitled to copy accounting records, which results in different judgments when different courts of justice deal with this issue. However, most of courts deny shareholders claim to copy accounting records, because they think the law doesn’t expressly authorize shareholders to do so and accounting records are trade secrets. This thesis draws such conclusions as below after comparative study on the relevant legal rules in the U.K., the U.S., Germany, japan and the Republic of Korea. Firstly, in the U.K., the U.S. and Germany, shareholders’ rights to know are not limited to written law. Secondly, those five countries list corporations’ financial information as important information to be released and design systems aimed at balancing shareholders’ rights to know and corporations’ interests. Thirdly, the right to inspect corporations’ financial conditions is bundled with the right to copy accounting records. This thesis questions Chinese courts’ decisions related to shareholders’ right to copy accounting records. The thesis have four reasons to support this opinion shareholders’ right to copy accounting record should be protected. Firstly, courts’ decisions are not consistent with “permissible unless forbidden” principle, which is the foundation of private law. The courts’ interpretation of law is too rigid to be reasonable. Secondly, accounting records cannot be regards as trade secrets from a legal perspective. Accounting records are corporations’ privacy to the public, but they should be fully known by the corporation’s shareholders, who are owners of the corporation. Thirdly, there exist logic mistakes in courts’ decisions and courts’ decisions to refuse shareholders’ right to copy accounting records cannot prevent financial information from being leaked. Lastly, the purpose of Article 33 is to counter major shareholders’ monopoly over information and protect the minor shareholders’ right to know. This purpose reflects the spirit of the Corporation Law. Courts decisions are contrary to the spirit. Finally, this thesis puts forward three suggestions for improvement of systems, which might better protect shareholders’ right to know. The first suggestion is that China should modify the Corporation Law or publish Judicial Interpretation to expressly authorize shareholders to copy accounting records. The second is to permit shareholders whose shares reach a certain proportion from joint stock companies to copy accounting records. The third is to ensure shareholders must perform an obligation to take good care of copied accounting records or other document.

중국어

中国《公司法》第33条对股东是否有权复制公司账簿没有明确规定，由此给司法审判带来结果的差异，但多数法院依据现行法律关于股东知情权保护的规定，以“法无明文规定”或“保护公司商业秘密”等为由，否认股东有权复制会计账簿的诉求。 为了解决这一疑问，笔者比较研究了英国、美国、德国、日本、韩国法律当中有关股东“账簿复制权”的规定，得出结论如下：第一，就英、美、德三国而言，股东享有的知情权的范围也不受限于成文法的明文规定。第二，五国都将公司的财务信息作为重点公开的信息，都设计了旨在均衡保护股东知情权与公司利益的法律制度。第三，查阅与复制是捆绑在一起的，查阅权包含复制的权利。 在比较研究的基础上，笔者对中国法院处理“账簿复制权”的办法提出了商榷。可商榷点有四：第一，法院以公司法没有明文规定为由否定股东复制会计账簿的权利与私法领域奉行“法无禁止皆可为”之原则不符。对法律条文的理解太过于机械。第二，法院以涉及商业秘密为由拒绝股东复制会计账簿的请求，会计账簿并非法律意义上的商业秘密，而是公司的隐私。财务信息对外而言是隐私，但股东作为公司的主人，知晓公司财务信息具有当然的正当性。第三，拒绝股东复制会计账簿难以达到保护财务信息不被泄露的目的而且易使判决在逻辑难以贯通。第四，公司法第33条目的就在于防止大股东对公司信息的垄断，旨在保护中小股东的知情权。拒绝股东此项权利与公司法“保护股东知情权”的精神背道而驰。 笔者认为，为更好地保护股东知情权，就需要承认股东的“账簿复制权”，具体可以从以下三个方面来完善当前的制度规范。第一，可以通过修改立法或者通过司法解释的方法，明文确定有限责任公司股东查阅会计账簿的权利包含复制会计账簿的权利；第二，持股超过一定比例的股份有限公司的股东也应享有查阅、复制会计账簿的权利；第三，对获取复印件的股东施加妥善保管复印文件的义务。