Publication Date

2010

Publication Title

Yale Law Journal

Abstract

In large Chapter 11 cases, the prototypical creditor is no longer a small player holding a claim much like everyone else's, but rather a distressed debt professional advancing her own agenda. Secured creditors are more pervasive and enjoy much more control than they had even a decade ago. Moreover, financial innovation has dramatically increased the complexity of each investor's position. As a result of these and other changes, the legal system now faces a challenge that is much like assembling a city block that has been broken up into many parcels. There exists an anticommons problem, a world in which ownership interests are fragmented and conflicting. This is quite at odds with the standard account of Chapter 11 -that it solves a tragedy of the commons, the collective action problem that exists when general creditors share numerous dispersed, but otherwise similar, interests. This Article draws on the lessons of cooperative game theory to show how, in combination, these recent changes are toxic. They undermine the coalition formation process that is a foundational assumption of Chapter 11.

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