Elke Heinrich-Pendl awarded post-doctoral degree from Bucerius Law School
Elke Heinrich-Pendl, senior research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law, received her post-doctoral degree (“Habilitation”) from Bucerius Law School on 2 March 2023. The venia legendi she was awarded covers the fields of private law, company law, banking law, and comparative law.
In her post-doctoral thesis “Kollegialorgane in Kapitalgesellschaften – Binnenorganisation von Vorstand und Aufsichtsrat in der Aktiengesellschaft” [Collegial Bodies in Stock Corporations – The Internal Organization of the Management Board and the Supervisory Board], Heinrich-Pendl identifies, explores, and contextualizes the various facets of the internal relationship within and between the board of directors and the supervisory board, based on the three pillars of diversity, cooperation, and control. The organization of the two company organs at issue illustrates pars pro toto the typical problems that arise specifically from an organizational structure featuring collegial bodies as decision-makers of a company. In addition to relying on her doctrinal analysis, the study is complemented by its broad historical perspective, comparative legal observations, and findings from social psychology research on (small) group behaviour.
Priv.-Doz. Dr. Elke Heinrich-Pendl studied law at the University of Graz, where in 2013 she was awarded her doctoral degree with distinction. Her dissertation, honoured with the Award of Excellence bestowed by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research as well as the Wolf Theiss Award, examined the role of creditworthiness assessments in Austrian and German consumer credit law. Since 2013 she has been conducting research at the Institute, where she also staffs the desk on Austria. She has taught at Bucerius Law School in Hamburg since 2017. In the winter semester 2022/23 she served as acting professor at the University of Mainz. Presently, she is standing in for Prof. Dr. Jens Koch at the University of Bonn.
Image: © Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law / Johanna Detering