The Great Recession has now produced the Great Unfreezing. For years shareowners and boards sparred over the same governance issues, frozen like ice into the same opposing positions. But the financial crisis, economic meltdown, and political change have combined to break the old mold of governance battles in surprising ways.
Take the hot-button issue of executive pay. In June the Obama administration proposed legislation likely to produce market-wide shareowner advisory votes on remuneration. A measure considered unthinkable just several years ago is about to become a fixture of American annual meetings. We wrote a column months ago advising boards to ...