La transparence des personnes morales en droit administratif se présente comme un argument visant à faire prévaloir la réalité de la situation d’une personne morale sur sa forme. L’argument de transparence entraîne une modification du rapport d’altérité entre deux personnes morales dont l’une est entièrement contrôlée par l’autre : alors qu’elles sont distinctes l’une de l’autre, le juge assimile l’organisme dépourvu d’autonomie à un service de la personne publique. La transparence n’est toutefois pas dotée d’un régime juridique stable et cohérent. L’opération de qualification est accessoire à sa mise en oeuvre, de sorte que les rapports juridiques entre les personnes morales varient. La personne morale n’est regardée comme « transparente » qu’à l’occasion d’un litige pour la résolution d’un problème juridique précis ; elle peut à nouveau être regardée comme distincte de la personne publique lors d’un nouveau procès. Avec cette technique, le juge administratif met en échec les effets de contournement des règles du droit administratif sans créer de règles ou d’exceptions jurisprudentielles nouvelles. Aux côtés du mandat administratif, l’argument de transparence permet de compléter l’arsenal de protection de la compétence du juge administratif et du respect des règles propres à l’administration, dont les effets et la portée peuvent être mesurés et adaptés aux situations. Il permet également aux requérants d’envisager une stratégie juridique susceptible de faire sauter l’obstacle de la personnalité morale de l’organisme que maîtrise totalement l’administration. / Piercing the veil of corporate entities in French administrative law appears as an argument which aims at letting the reality of the situation of a corporate entity prevail over its form. This argument of transparency modifies the relation of alterity between two corporate entities in which one is completely controlled by the other: while they are distinct from each other, the judge assimilates the organization devoid of autonomy to a service belonging to the public entity. However, transparency is not provided with a stable and coherent legal regime. The operation of qualification is incidental to its implementation, so that judiciary relations between corporate entities vary. The corporate entity is only regarded as “transparent” in the course of a litigation concerning the resolving of a precise judiciary problem; it can be considered as distinct again from the public entity at a new trial. With this process, the administrative judge defeats the bypassing of the rules of administrative law without creating any new rule or jurisprudential exception. Together with administrative mandates, the argument of transparency allows to complete the arsenal of protection of the administrative judge’s authority and to enforce administrative rules, whose effects and reach can be measured and adapted to situations. It also allows petitioners to consider a legal strategy that may overcome the obstacle posed by the corporate entity of the organization which is completely controlled by the administration

Ces travaux de thèse portent sur la question de l'assemblage multi-matériaux polymère-acier. Dans un environnement automobile grande série, le rivetage auto-poinçonneur est le procédé d'assemblage proposé qui permet de répondre à la problématique industrielle. Dans un premier temps, la faisabilité de la technique i été étudiée en recherchant l'influence de la vitesse de rivetage et de l'effort serre-flan sur les caractéristiques géométriques du joint riveté et sur la tenue mécanique. Ainsi, il se révèle que l'augmentation de la vitesse de rivetage a un effet favorable: l'effort à la rupture en traction pure augmente de +10% en accord avec l'augmentation de l'ancrage mécanique. Par contre, l'augmentation de l'effort serre-flan a un effet défavorable : l'effort à la rupture en traction pure et en traction-cisaillement diminue de -6.6%. Par la suite, un modèle numérique 2D axisymétrique a été mis au point dans le but de simuler l'opération de rivetage. Les propriétés mécaniques effectives du matériau composite sont estimées par une méthode d'homogénéisation tandis que le comportement mécanique du matériau acier par un modèle élasto-plastique endommageable. Comparée à la coupe transversale issue d'un essai expérimental, la simulation effectuée sous Abaqus 6.10- 1® démontre être capable de correctement prédire la déformée en particulier pour la valeur d'ancrage mécanique. Enfin, un modèle numérique 30 a été développé et permet de simuler des chargements destructifs et asymétriques. L'effort à rupture et les déformées macroscopiques estimées sont en bon accord avec les résultats expérimentaux, grâce notamment à la prise en compte de l'endommagement local de la couche composite. / This thesis work is dealing with the issue of multi-material polymer-steel joining. Within a large-scale automotive environment, self-piercing riveting is the proposed joining technique to tackle the industrial challenge. Firstly, the feasibility of the technique is studied by investigating the influence of the riveting velocity and the sheet holder load on the geometrical characteristics of the riveted joint and the mechanical strength. Thus, it turns out that the increase in riveting velocity has a favorable effect: the joint strength in pure tension mode increases by +10% in agreement with the increase in mechanical anchoring. However, the increase of the sheet holder load has an unfavorable effect: the joint strength in cross tension and in shear modes decreases by -6.6%. Subsequently, an axisymmetrical 20 numerical model has been created enabling the simulation of the riveting operation. The effective mechanical properties of the composite material are estimated by a homogenization method while the mechanical behavior of the steel material is managed through an elastic-plastic model with damage. Compared with a cross section resulting from an experimental test, the simulation carried out under Abaqus 6.10-1® demonstrates being able to correctly predict the deformations, the anchoring value more particularly. Finally, a 30 numerical model has been developed and allows the simulation of destructive and asymmetrical loadings. The joint strength and the macroscopic deformations estimated are in good agreement with the experimental results, especially when taking into account the local damage of the composite laver.

This PhD thesis is comprised of 3 results in computational geometry and graph theory. In the first paper, I demonstrate that the piercing number of a set S of pairwise intersecting convex shapes in the plane is bounded by O(\alpha(S)), where \alpha(S) is the fatness of the set S, improving upon the previous upper-bound of O(\alpha(S)^2). In the second article, I show that anagram-free vertex colouring of a 2\times n square grid requires a number of colours that increases with n. This answers an open question in Wilson's thesis and shows that even graphs of pathwidth 2 do not have anagram-free colouring with a bounded number of colours. The third article is a study on the geodesic anagram-free chromatic number of chordal and interval graphs. \emph{Geodesic anagram-free chromatic number} is defined as the minimum number of colours required to colour a graph such that all shortest paths between any pair of vertices are coloured anagram-free. In particular, I prove that the geodesic anagram-free chromatic number of a chordal graph G is 32p'w, where p' is the pathwidth of the subtree intersection representation graph (tree) of G, and w is the clique number of G. Additionally, I prove that the geodesic anagram-free chromatic number of an interval graph is bounded by 32p, where p is the pathwidth of the interval graph. This PhD thesis is comprised of 3 results in computational geometry and graph theory.

No description available.

Dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) has been well established in both clinical and research settings for measurement of bone mineral density (BMD), and is becoming more widely utilized for assessment of body composition. Reliability and validity are essential factors in both applications of this technique; however, neither have been confirmed for the QDR-4500A DXA at Virginia Tech. Therefore, measurements of the whole body (WB), lumbar spine (LS), total proximal femur (TPF) and total forearm (TF) were made in a group of young-adult males and females at two time-points, 5-7 days apart. Significant differences were not found in BMD (g/cm2) at these body sites with repeated measurements by DXA. Furthermore, measures of percent body fat (%BF), lean body mass (LBM), and fat mass (FM) by DXA were reliable. Validity of %BF by DXA was assessed from comparison to single-frequency bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA). Significant differences were not found in measures of %BF by DXA and BIA. A second study investigated the reliability and validity of the QDR-4500A DXA in measurements of distal tibia (DT) BMD. Significant differences were not found between repeated measurements. Validity was established by a significant correlation between WB BMD and DT BMD. A third study examined the influence of navel jewelry on the accuracy of LS DXA measurements. Repeated measurements with a spine phantom revealed that both a navel ring and a barbell produced significantly greater measures of LS BMD compared to the spine phantom alone. Manual correction of navel jewelry did not eliminate BMD inaccuracies. Data from these studies confirmed that the QDR-4500A DXA at Virginia Tech was a reliable and valid device in measurement of WB, LS, TPF, TF and DT BMD, as well as %BF, LBM, and FM. In addition, effects of navel jewelry on LS BMD have been recognized. Further studies investigating the reliability and validity of DT BMD measures as well as effects of different types, gauges, and shapes of body jewelry on BMD measures in human subjects are warranted. / Master of Science

Milan Kostohryz Piercing the Corporate Veil - Selected Issues in International Comparison Abstract The main purpose of the thesis is to give recommendation for possible application of the piercing doctrine in the Czech Republic. Secondary purposes are (i) analysis of effects caused by disregarding the principles of limited liability and separate legal personality because of piercing and (ii) detailed description of approaches to the piercing issue in selected legal systems (USA, UK and Germany). The thesis starts with some terminological issues; it introduces the possible Czech equivalents of the notion "piercing the corporate veil" and explains that it can have slightly different meaning depending on the individual author. The differences stem especially from the questions whether piercing negates only the principle of limited liability or also the principle of separate personality; whether so called inner piercing (Innenhaftung) shall be part of the doctrine and whether the piercing doctrine shall be regarded as product of case-law only. Also some special forms of piercing (reverse piercing, lateral piercing and insider piercing) are introduced. The third chapter analyses the relationship between the piercing doctrine and the principles of limited liability and separate legal personality. In particular it...

Groups of companies offer considerable economic and practical advantages over other forms of business organizations. However, the phenomenon creates a long list of problems in terms of antitrust law, tax law, labour law, corporate law, and in the case of international companies, conflict of laws. National laws do not provide a complete solution to these problems because groups of companies are still governed by traditional corporate law, which is designed to govern single independent companies. On the other hand, harmonization of the law of corporate groups across Common legal systems is neither feasible not advisable. The most important problem which has not yet been completely solved by Common law systems is the liability of groups of companies for the debts of their subsidiaries. This has been described as "one of the great unsolved problems of modern company law". The present study aims to analyse the solutions provided by Common law systems to this problem and evaluate if they provide a solid settlement or whether further safeguards are needed for those dealing with corporate groups, namely minority shareholders and outsiders including creditors. By using a comparative approach with the Islamic law system, the study evaluates if the Common law solutions are also applicable in such a religious system or whether, due to its unique character Islamic law needs to create its own solution. This comparative approach assesses the possibilities of harmonization between Common law and Islamic law systems and promotes the Islamisation of modern laws in Islamic countries.

A convenção de arbitragem pode possuir uma abrangência subjetiva maior do que aquela que aparentemente lhe é conferida pelo contrato no qual está inserida. Podem ser partes sujeitos que a ela não aderiram expressamente, o que não contraria a autonomia da vontade, pois o fato de não terem consentido por escrito não impede que o tenham feito de maneira tácita. Dessa forma, é possível que não signatários sejam partes da convenção de arbitragem. A prática arbitral identificou algumas situações que frequentemente colocam os julgadores diante da missão de determinar se há consentimento por parte de não signatários: a existência de um grupo de sociedades ou de um grupo de contratos; a incorporação por referência; a estipulação em favor de terceiro; a existência de representação; a transferência de um contrato por meio de cessão ou sucessão e a subrogação; e o desvio da personalidade jurídica, que pode levar à sua desconsideração. Além disso, os tribunais norte-americanos se utilizam da teoria chamada estoppel, de acordo com a qual um sujeito, sob determinadas circunstâncias, fica impedido de negar a aplicabilidade da cláusula compromissória. Os limites subjetivos da convenção de arbitragem são objeto de estudo no meio arbitral há bastante tempo, mas não faz muitos anos que a questão começou a ser debatida no Brasil. A análise da Lei de Arbitragem brasileira demonstra que muitas das lições aprendidas no cenário internacional podem ser aproveitadas no país. / The arbitration agreement may have a larger subjective scope than the one that is actually conferred to it by the agreement in which it operates. Individuals who have not adhered expressly to the arbitration agreement may be subject to it, and such situation does not imply that referred arbitration agreement is against their free will, since the fact that they have not consented in writing does not mean that they have not done so tacitly. Thus, it is possible that non-signatories are parties to the arbitration agreement. The arbitral practice identified several situations in which judges and arbitrators often have to determine whether there is a consent by non-signatories: the existence of a group of companies or a group of contracts; incorporation by reference; the stipulation in favor of third party; the existence of representation; the transfer of an agreement by assignment or succession and subrogation; and the abuse of legal personality, which can lead to the piercing of the corporate veil. Moreover, U.S. courts make use of a theory called estoppel, according to which an individual, under certain circumstances, is estopped from denying the enforceability of the arbitration clause. The limits of the arbitration agreement have been object of study in the arbitration scene for a long period of time, but only recently the question began to be discussed in Brazil. Analysis of the Brazilian Arbitration Law demonstrates that many of the lessons learned in the international arena may be applicable in Brazil.

This dissertation deals with international company law, namely with piercing the corporate veil doctrine. The dissertation is divided, apart from introduction and conclusion, into 5 chapters. Chapter I deals with general definition of the doctrine. Chapter II explains that the complexity of the doctrine is caused by a fact that it actually consists of several related questions. This Chapter offers an answer to the most serious one - the predictability of use of the doctrine. Chapter III discusses current questions related to the piercing. Chapter IV brings an analysis of use of the piercing in chosen developed legal orders including a comparison summary. Finally, Chapter V is devoted to possibility of use of the doctrine in Czech law. Key words: International company law; piercing the corporate veil; breakthrough of the property independence; limited liability of shareholders; capital companies; economic analysis of law; closely held corporations; voluntary and involuntary creditors.

科学研究費補助金 研究種目:基盤研究(C) 課題番号:17560095 研究代表者:森 敏彦 研究期間:2005-2006年度