Study On The Moderate Limitation Of The Exercise Of Shareholders’ Right To Know

The modern company system is based on the separation of shareholder ownership and the control of the company’s operations,and the shareholders as the funder are generally not directly involved in the company’s business management activities,so it is necessary to give shareholders the right to know the company’s information.The right to know of shareholders plays an important role in the system of shareholders’ rights,and is the basis and premise for shareholders to safeguard their rights and participate in the management of the company.In order to better protect the exercise of shareholders’ right to know,the Company Law and a series of "Judicial Interpretations of the Company Law" issued by the Supreme People’s Court continuously improve the system of shareholders’ right to know and strengthen the relief of the damage to shareholders’ right to know.In the long run,the exercise of the right to know by shareholders is not only beneficial to the shareholders to supervise the company’s behavior,protect the legitimate rights and interests of shareholders,but also to make correct decisions on the basis of understanding the company’s information.However,the exercise of the right to know by shareholders is not without boundaries,and if shareholders are not allowed to exercise their right to know without restraint,they will result in the abuse of rights.The abuse of shareholders’ rights violates the basic principles of civil law,will infringe the company’s trade secrets,threaten the company’s interests,reduce the company’s operational efficiency,and even indirectly damage the legitimate interests of other shareholders of the company,so there are reasonable reasons for the exercise of shareholders’ right to know to be moderately restricted.According to the current provisions on the exercise of shareholders’ right to know and the problems in practice,there are problems such as unclear definition of subject,unclear scope of exercise and vague definition of "legitimate purpose",and the ambiguity of legislative provisions makes it difficult to refine the protection of shareholders’ right to know in practice.The threshold of the exercise of shareholders’ right to know is too high,which is contrary to the legislative value of the Company Law,which is not conducive to protecting the legitimate rights and interests of shareholders,and the threshold of the exercise of shareholders’ right to know is too low,which can easily lead to the abuse of rights and damage the legitimate rights and interests of the company,so it is necessary to make reasonable restrictions on the exercise of the right to know by shareholders under the premise of balancing the interests of shareholders with the interests of the company.In the view of comparative law,many developed countries abroad have provided us with a lot of advanced experience,analyzing the aspects we can learn from,such as according to the type of company to clarify the exercise of shareholders’ right to know,the establishment of prior written inquiry system,the introduction of the inspection of candidates,etc.It can help us to further improve the system of exercising shareholders’ right to know,to restrict the abuse of shareholders’ right to know,to standardize the exercise of shareholders’ right to know,and to realize the balance between shareholders’ interests and the interests of the company.