269Redefining the Conceptual Ground of Corporate Governance Regulation

This article intends to provide an overview about the latest sustainability-related developments of European corporate governance. As a theoretical background it interprets the concept of sustainability and compares the competing theories regarding the purpose of public corporations in this context. The article attempts to provide an overview about the ‘interests of the company’ in European company law and the relevant interests that corporate directors should consider in EU Member States. It emphasizes the importance of corporate sustainability reporting in EU legislation; hence the Non-Financial Reporting Directive and the recently adopted Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive are examined in detail. The article also pays attention to the latest sustainability-related requirements of important European corporate governance codes and summarizes the emerging best-practice rules. It recognizes numerous promising developments and highlights the proposed Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive as it would make the EU regulatory system more coherent. The article concludes that the dominance of anti-fraud issues in corporate governance standard setting seems to be over and there is a new regulatory wave which focuses on sustainability. However, no breakthrough can be reached without a proper business environment and economic culture developed in the whole EU, which promotes sustainable corporate governance.270