Fenner Stewart

Dr. Fenner Stewart

PhD

Positions

Associate Professor

Faculty of Law

Research Fellow

School of Public Policy

Contact information

Email

fenner.stewart@ucalgary.ca

Web presence

Fenner Stewart in the News

LinkedIn

Location

Office: MFH4341

Background

Educational Background

PhD Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, 2014

LLM University of British Columbia, 2004

JD University of British Columbia, 2001

BA English, University of Prince Edward Island, 1995

Biography

Dr. Fenner Stewart is an Associate Professor at the University of Calgary (Alberta), a Research Fellow at The School of Public Policy, and an Affiliated Researcher at the Marcel A. Desautels Centre for Private Enterprise and the Law. His scholarship has garnered recognition from appellate courts, notably citations from the Supreme Court of Canada (2019) and the Supreme Court of Ohio (2016, 2020, 2022). Dr. Stewart has been honoured with multiple awards for excellence in teaching (2016, 2019, 2021) and scholarly contributions (2018, 2024).

Dr. Stewart has taught a wide range of courses, including Business Associations, Comparative Corporate Law, Corporate Finance, Federalism, Globalization, Legal Theory, Negotiations, Public Policy Research Methods, Public Policy Theory, and various subjects related to energy law.

He teaches a graduate workshop in jurisprudence and supervises graduate research in regulatory theory, business law, comparative law, and fiduciary law, frequently within the context of resource management.

He currently holds a position as the Climate Governance Consultant at the Canada Climate Law Initiative, and is an Affiliated Researcher at Marcel A. Desautels Centre for Private Enterprise and the Law.

Dr. Stewart received his doctorate in 2014, focusing his research on company law and governance, particularly their operation within the liminal spaces at the boundaries between public law’s assertions of regulatory authority and private law’s resistance to such intrusions. From the outset of his doctoral work, Dr. Stewart’s scholarship has been grounded in historical perspective, inspired by Justice Holmes’s enduring challenge to jurists and legal scholars:

The rational study of law is still to a large extent the study of history. History must be a part of the study because without it we cannot know the precise scope of rules which it is our business to know. — Oliver Wendell Holmes, The Path of the Law (1897).

Dr. Stewart’s ongoing research continues to draw inspiration from the three central themes he first explored in his doctoral work, which together define the scope of his research program, namely:

  1. Company Law
  2. The Liminal Spaces between Public and Private Law
  3. Legal History

Below is a summary of Dr. Stewart’s publications, illustrating how each aligns with one or more of these central themes.

Research

Areas of Research

Company Law
  • “Courting Trouble: Stakeholder Norms and Fiduciary Reforms” (Conference Paper, October 2025): Examines directors’ duties of care and loyalty as historically understood up to 2004 to underscore the radical nature of judicial reforms introduced by the Supreme Court of Canada in Peoples v Wise (2004). Scheduled for presentation at the “Conference on the 50th Anniversary of the Canada Business Corporations Act.”
  • “Fiduciary Fumbles and Judicial Stumbles: Rethinking Directors’ Duties” (Conference Paper, September 2025): Critically assesses the historical development of fiduciary law and unincorporated joint-stock companies as essential background to understanding Canadian doctrinal evolution concerning directors’ duties, culminating in an in-depth critique of the Supreme Court's rulings in Peoples v Wise (2004) and BCE Inc. v. 1976 Debentureholders (2008). Scheduled for presentation at the “9th Annual Canadian Commercial Law Symposium”.
  • “Dominium and The Empire of Laws” (2019): Advocates for Philippe Pettit’s civic republicanism as a more effective theoretical framework for corporate social responsibility compared to traditional liberal approaches.
  • “Book Review of ‘Innovation and the State: Finance, Regulation, and Justice’” (2019): Reviews Cristie Ford’s historical exploration of flexible regulatory approaches, examining its significance for regulatory innovation in business law and financial regulation.
  • “The Contested Grounds of Economic Order” (2019): Reviews Vanisha Sukdeo’s study of workers’ rights, providing an extended analysis of non-state regulatory mechanisms in labour law.
  • “A History of Canadian Corporate Law” (2018): Provides the Canadian chapter in an edited handbook exploring the historical evolution of corporate and company law across multiple national contexts.
  • “Behind the Cloak of Corporate Social Responsibility” (2018): Critically examines the use and implications of corporate social responsibility narratives within regulatory frameworks.
  • “The Corporation, New Governance, and the Power of the Publicization Narrative” (2014): Critically evaluates regulatory capitalism by examining progressive arguments in favour of corporate deregulation, arguments that rely heavily on the promise of the ‘publicization of the private’.
  • “Indeterminacy and Balance” (2012): Utilizes theories from John Dewey, among others, to critique essentialist conceptions of the corporation.
  • “The Primacy of Delaware and the Embeddedness of the Firm” (2011): Explores the evolution of corporate law through theoretical and historical lenses provided by Karl Polanyi and Simon Deakin.
  • “The Place of Corporate Lawmaking in American Society” (2011): Analyzes historical and contemporary debates that have shaped corporate law structures in the United States.
  • “Berle’s Conception of Shareholder Primacy” (2011): Provides a detailed historical analysis of the Berle-Dodd debate from the 1930s Harvard Law Review, examining competing conceptions of directors’ fiduciary duties.
The Liminal Spaces Between Public and Private Law
  • “A History of Crude Externalities” (2025): Examines Alberta’s regulatory strategies aimed at ensuring companies adequately manage asset retirement obligations, thereby preventing cleanup costs from externalizing onto taxpayers. Winner, Canadian Academy of Legal Studies in Business Distinguished Paper Award, 2024.
  • “National Carbon Pricing in Canada” (2023): Analyzes the interplay between federal and provincial regulatory frameworks that define private market boundaries, within which companies strategically minimize carbon emission costs.
  • “The Problem, Solution, and Public Governance of Climate Change” (2023): Investigates interactions between state and non-state regulatory actors within multi-level governance frameworks addressing climate change, derived from an SSHRC-funded research project led by the author.
  • “POGG Post References re Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act” (2023): Explores constitutional, jurisdictional, and political tensions arising from federally imposed carbon-pricing benchmarks for emissions markets, and examines how these benchmarks influence private-sector strategies for managing carbon emissions in a cost-effective manner.
  • “The Contested Grounds of Economic Order” (2019): Analyzes the interplay between governmental and non-governmental mechanisms in regulating labor rights, highlighting regulatory complexities within public-private interactions.
  • “Book Review of ‘Innovation and the State: Finance, Regulation, and Justice’” (2019): Examines the historical evolution and impact of flexible regulatory theory and practices, emphasizing their significance in enabling public-private governance.
  • “Behind the Cloak of Corporate Social Responsibility” (2018): Critically evaluates narratives advocating the blurred boundaries between public oversight and private corporate compliance in governance.
  • “How to Deal with a Fickle Friend? Alberta’s Troubles with The Doctrine of Federal Paramountcy” (2018): Investigates disputes stemming from corporate mismanagement of assets and environmental liabilities, provoking jurisdictional conflicts between federal and provincial authorities over bankrupt estates. Cited five times by the Supreme Court of Canada in 2019.
  • “Holistic Security Risk Management Strategies for E&Ps” (2018): Empirically examines security strategies adopted by private exploration and production companies operating in politically unstable regions where effective public protection is lacking, revealing how these companies manage political and security responsibilities traditionally fulfilled by public authorities.
  • “Interjurisdictional Immunity, Federal Paramountcy, Co-operative Federalism, and the Disinterested Regulator” (2018): Provides an alternative analysis of how corporate mismanagement of assets and environmental liabilities leads to jurisdictional tensions between federal and provincial governments.
  • “Regulating Energy Innovation” (2016): Evaluates state-level regulatory responses in the U.S. to public interventions in private-sector risk management practices related to hydraulic fracturing, with particular focus on liability issues arising from induced seismicity. Winner, The Willoughby Prize for Best Article, 2018.
  • “When the Shale Gale Hit Ohio” (2015): Examines litigation arising from ambiguity regarding the legality of governmental intervention in property rights through legislation causing automatic reversion of private mineral leases to original landowners, thereby obstructing lucrative leasing opportunities during the Midwestern shale gas boom that began in Ohio in 2011. Cited by the Supreme Court of Ohio (2022, 2020, 2016).
  • “Foreign Judgments, Judicial Trailblazing, and the Cost of Cross-Border Complexity: Thoughts on Chevron Corp v Yaiguaje” (2015): Explores the complexities of enforcing foreign judgments, particularly when debtors liquidate and relocate assets beyond the original jurisdiction. The article evaluates Canadian courts’ willingness to recognize foreign judgments against multinational extraction firms holding significant assets in Canada, highlighting intersections among domestic jurisdictions, international relations, and transnational business practices.
  • “The Corporation, New Governance, and the Power of the Publicization Narrative” (2014): Critically analyzes regulatory capitalism, scrutinizing claims around public-private governance and the associated risks inherent in such frameworks.
Legal History
  • “The Paradox of Canadian Progress” (2025): Reviews the second volume of the Canadian Legal History series by Jim Phillips, Philip Girard, and R. Blake Brown, which covers the period from 1867 to 1914. The review reflects critically upon Canada’s complex and sometimes troubling journey toward modernity, highlighting the pivotal and evolving role of law in shaping the nation’s historical trajectory.
  • “A History of Crude Externalities” (2025): Offers an in-depth institutional history of Alberta’s regulatory approaches to asset retirement obligations in the oil and gas sector over four decades. By tracing the evolution of these regulatory strategies, the paper demonstrates how historical awareness enhances the assessment of current efforts to promote responsible asset management. Winner, Canadian Academy of Legal Studies in Business Distinguished Paper Award, 2024.
  • “Debt, Deals, and Dominion” (2024): Reviews Thomas Telfer and Virginia Torrie’s comprehensive history of federal-provincial disputes over bankruptcy and insolvency regulation. The review critically assesses whether judicial actors, working within Canada’s contested federal-provincial framework of the 1880s and 1890s, could have developed a clear understanding of constitutional responsibilities in bankruptcy and insolvency matters during that period.
  • “Book Review of ‘Innovation and the State: Finance, Regulation, and Justice’” (2019): Examines the historical evolution and impact of flexible regulatory theory and practices.
  • “Economic Recovery Post Covid-19: An American Retrospective” (2019): Explores potential economic recovery paths for the United States following the COVID-19 pandemic, drawing parallels to historical instances of rapid economic resurgence following national crises in the United States.
  • “A History of Canadian Corporate Law” (2018): Provides a Canadian perspective in an edited volume examining the history of company law across multiple jurisdictions. The chapter illustrates that, despite sharing historical roots with Anglo-American corporate law, Canada has followed a distinctive path of legal development.
  • “Berle’s Conception of Shareholder Primacy” (2011): Critically reassesses the historical Berle-Dodd debate, challenging prevailing views that portray Adolf Berle as an early proponent of the contemporary shareholder primacy framework. By highlighting Berle’s own characterization of himself as “the American Karl Marx,” the article emphasizes the importance of accurate historical interpretation in clarifying the conceptual boundaries and contemporary implications of shareholder primacy in corporate law.

Courses

Course number Course title Semester
Law 509 Business Associations
Law 513 Negotiations
Law 705 Graduate Seminar in Legal Theory

Awards

  • Canadian Academy of Legal Studies in Business Distinguished Paper Award, 2024
  • Dentons Canada LLP Research Fellow in Energy Law & Policy, 2021
  • Stikeman Elliott LLP Research Fellow in Corporate Law, 2021
  • University of Calgary Students’ Union Teaching Excellence Award, 2021
  • Social Science and Humanities Research Council’s Connection Grant Award , Government of Canada (Principal Investigator). 2020
  • Dentons Canada LLP Research Fellow in Energy Law & Policy, 2019
  • University of Calgary Internationalization Achievement Award, 2019
  • Association of International Petroleum Negotiators Professor in Residence, 2019
  • Association of International Petroleum Negotiators Negotiation Skills Award, Association of International Petroleum Negotiators. 2019
  • Willoughby Prize for Article of Outstanding Merit, International Bar Association / Journal of Energy & Natural Resources Law. 2018
  • Shea Nerland Calnan LLP Research Fellow in Tax Law, Shea Nerland Calnan LLP. 2017
  • CIBC Centre for Corporate Governance and Risk Management Research Fellowship, 2011
  • Comparative Law and Political Economy Research Fellowship, 2011
  • Some Institutes of Advanced Study Summer Fellowship, 2011
  • Comparative Law and Political Economy Research Fellowship, 2010
  • Comparative Law and Political Economy Research Fellowship, 2009
  • Comparative Law and Political Economy Research Fellowship, 2008
  • Comparative Law and Political Economy Research Fellowship, 2007
  • William Z. Estey Teaching Fellowship, 2007
  • Comparative Law and Political Economy Research Fellowship, 2006
  • William Z. Estey Teaching Fellowship, 2006
  • William Z. Estey Teaching Fellowship, 2005

Publications

Google Scholar

SSRN

In the News