Corporate governance reform is currently on the agenda in the European Union, the United States, Japan and in emerging market economies. This book takes a fresh look at the reform debate by focusing on the trade-offs involved in reconciling the diverging interests of shareholders, creditors and managers. It shows how effective corporate governance systems exploit complementarities between the incentives generated by the capital structure, the ownership structure, investor monitoring, takeover threats, and management compensation to minimize the sum of all agency costs facing the public corporation. The book combines a general theoretical treatment with a detailed study of the institutions of corporate governance in Germany, Japan and the United States and a critical assessment of recent reforms.