Legal systems around the world apply various strategies to mitigate agency costs between controlling and minority shareholders. A systematic review of the transnational law on the loyalty and care obligations of controlling shareholders reveals various doctrinal choices. This study aims to uncover the evolution of these choices by employing a law-in-context methodology. Accordingly, it seeks to explain the differences in governance selections by exploring the cultural, historical and socio-economic backgrounds of the particular legal systems in which organisations and decisions are embodied. I conduct a macro-level inquiry which focuses on the cultural environment and business history development to understand different doctrinal designs. In particular, I argue that those dissimilarities are a result of unique cultural-non-formal norms of corporate governance regarding the protection afforded to shareholders’ interests and they correspond to the historical development of the law of corporate groups across nations. As the macro-level investigation indicates, any initiative to globally converge corporate law and governance should be carried out with caution because it may distort the delicate normative equilibrium represented in a given jurisdiction.

世界各地的法律体系采用各种策略来降低控股股东和少数股东之间的代理成本。对关于控股股东忠诚和关怀义务的跨国法律的系统审查揭示了各种教义选择。本研究旨在通过采用情境法方法来揭示这些选择的演变。因此，它试图通过探索体现组织和决策的特定法律制度的文化、历史和社会经济背景来解释治理选择的差异。我进行宏观层面的调查，重点关注文化环境和商业历史发展，以了解不同的教义设计。尤其是，我认为，这些差异是公司治理中关于保护股东利益的独特文化非正规规范的结果，它们与跨国公司集团法的历史发展相一致。正如宏观调查所表明的那样，任何旨在全球融合公司法和治理的举措都应谨慎执行，因为它可能会扭曲特定司法管辖区所代表的微妙规范均衡。