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No. 3-4 (149-150) (2001): 45 lat Instytutu Nauk Prawnych Polskiej Akademii Nauk 1956-2001
Artykuły

Umowa spółki handlowej

[Commercial company’s articles of association]

  • Andrzej Szajkowski

Published 2001-12-30

Keywords

  • commercial company,
  • corporate law,
  • contrach,
  • conclude a contract
Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

How to Cite

Umowa spółki handlowej: [Commercial company’s articles of association]. (2001). Studia Prawnicze The Legal Studies, 3-4 (149-150), 319-335. https://doi.org/10.37232/sp.2001.3-4.20

Abstract

The terms 'commercial partnership' and “commercial company” are to be construed as both a permanent legal relationship created by the articles of association of a commercial company of a certain statutory type and an organisational unit, i.e. a private-law organisation binding at least two partners or shareholders - unless it is a single-member ]company - in order to achieve a common goal, and for the realisation of which they contribute certain assets to the created company in the form of contributions (in cash or in kind).

Unwillingness to conclude the partnership agreement or the articles of association and establish a partnership or a company renders the arrangement sham, thus preventing the valid establishment of the entity. This is because a declaration of intent made to the other party with his or her consent to the appearance is invalid - cf. Article 83 § 1 of the Civil Code.

It is also not permissible to substitute acts of intent as to the participation of certain persons in a certain partnership or company with decisions of other entities that have no competence to make statements that would legally bind those certain (other) persons.

Due to the statutory restriction on the freedom of legal action of the parties to the articles of association of a joint-stock company as well as of the general meeting of such company (laid down in Article 304 § 3 of the Code of Commercial Partnerships and Companies), it is not at all permissible to change the lower limit of the composition of the supervisory board of a joint-stock company.

The term “consensual intention of parties' encompasses the partnership’s or the company’s objects as defined in the partnership agreement or articles of association (see e.g. Article 21 § 1(2), Article 25(2), Article 91(2), Article 105(2), Article 130(2), Article 157 § 1(2) and Article 304 § 1(2) CCPC). Therefore, 'making contributions' in a partnership or company, as defined in Article 3 CCPC is, of course, not a goal in itself, but only a means to achieve (implement) the common goal assumed by the partners or shareholders.

The provisions relating to various statutory types of commercial partnerships and companies do not, in principle, directly specify a designated obligation of a member to additionally cooperate in a manner different than that described in Article 3 CCPC. However, such an obligation follows indirectly from legal provisions: a) in a general partnership, a limited partnership and limited joint-stock partnership - with regard to the obligation of a general partner to manage the affairs of the company, unless a given partner has been released from the obligation to manage such affairs;  b) in a professional partnership - with regard to the partner's exercise of his or her (liberal) profession within the partnership;  c) in a limited partnership - with regard to the limited partner's designation in the text of the agreement of a specified amount of liability towards the company's creditors for the obligations of the company, i.e. the so-called 'limited partnership sum'.

The partnership agreement or articles of association may impose obligations on a particular member of the partnership or company other than the payment of a contribution (cf., e.g., Article 159 or 304 § 2(2) CCPC). In such a case, the obligation to fulfil the thus designated duties arises from an additional contractual obligation of the concerned member and falls within the scope of that member's duty of cooperation. Its object is that specifically designated (in the partnership agreement or in articles of association) duty to the company.

If, after the registration of a commercial company, it turns out that its articles of association fail to identify the members or fail to specify share rights acquired by the shareholders, the registration court, acting pursuant to Article 21 of the Polish Code of Commercial Partnerships and Companies, may issue a decision on the dissolution of the company entered in the register on the grounds that 'no articles of association have been concluded' - see Article 21 § 1(1) of CCPC. If, on the other hand, 'the articles of association do not contain provisions concerning the company's name, the company’s objects, share capital or contributions', the court will only be able to rule on the dissolution of such a company on the basis of Article 21(1)(2) of CCPC.

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