Is Shareholder Democracy Encouraging Private Buyouts of Public Firms?

Last month I published this op-ed in the Financial Times questioning whether the push for greater “shareholder democracy” may end up harming public investors by driving companies into the arms of private equity firms.  After assessing the substantial increase in private equity activity in recent years, the piece concludes:

There is reason to suspect that the modern trend towards greater “shareholder power” has gone too far and is beginning to harm the very shareholders it was designed to protect.  A certain level of investor protection and power is, of course, essential to an honest and healthy public market.  But you can have too much of a good thing.  The buyout trend suggests we may already have too much “shareholder democracy”–at least, too much for shareholders’ own good.