LEST – Law, Economics and Sustainable Transition

LEST – Law, Economics and Sustainable Transition is a law-based research area within the Faculty of Business Studies that examines how legal rules, economic instruments and governance models can be used to drive sustainable, digitally mature and legally robust development in both the private and the public sector.

The point of departure is that law not only sets the formal rules of the game but also shapes the incentives that govern behaviour, from investment, financing and reporting to accountability, supervision and sanctions, and is therefore crucial to the pace, effectiveness and legitimacy of the transition. The research orientation explores the legal framework for health promoting work.

Tax law

A central pillar of LEST is tax law. The research investigates how taxes, charges and deductions can be designed to steer capital flows and behavioural choices towards climate and resilience objectives while maintaining competitiveness and the neutrality of the tax system. This includes assessments of climate and energy taxation and the effectiveness of investment incentives; the interaction between corporate and shareholder taxation and corporate governance; and the role of VAT in circular business models. Equally important is the tax procedure, encompassing legally secure timing of income and deductions, audit transparency, evidentiary issues in tax investigations, and the relationship between administrative sanctions and criminal liability. Here, economic crime, including tax and VAT fraud, aggressive tax planning and money laundering, is linked to practical compliance solutions and procedural strategies. Tax law concerns the financing of the public sector and therefore constitutes a fundamental precondition for all publicly funded health promoting work. Examples include the funding of public health care and wellness services.

Civil law

LEST also builds a strong profile in civil law, with three areas of particular strength. In property and land law, the research covers transactions, securities, usufructs and green contracts (such as green leases), as well as the allocation of risk and responsibility in energy-efficiency measures and sustainable urban development. In company law, the focus is on directors’ and managers’ duties, incentive and reporting structures (including sustainability and financial reporting), and how governance and ownership models can accommodate transition requirements without undermining innovation capacity. In insolvency law, the research explores restructuring and bankruptcy in light of the capital needs of the transition, examining the priority and robustness of security interests, the handling of environmental and supplier obligations, directors’ duties in the vicinity of insolvency, and the legal tools that can preserve value and employment in green restructuring processes. In this field, the research orientation provides research-based input to the Real Estate Broker Programme. Civil law sets the legal framework for private health‑promoting activities. Examples include different forms of corporate structures for collaboration, such as between public and private actors.

Procedural law

Procedural law runs as a connecting thread through the whole field. We analyse evidence and evidentiary standards in both civil and administrative proceedings, including digital evidence and AI-generated material, interim measures, judicial review of administrative decisions and the functioning of effective sanctioning systems. Procedural tools are directly linked to tax and accounting matters, public procurement and competition, as well as to the combating of economic crime through proportionate procedures and legally sound sanctions. While substantive law, such as tax law and civil law, concerns who is entitled to a right, procedural law regulates how the party who is entitled to a right can have that right enforced. Procedural law is therefore an area that is essential for all other fields of law.

Social law

To ensure the social sustainability of the transition, social law is fully integrated into the research area. This includes the effects of structural change on social insurance and welfare law, the embedding of equality, proportionality and legal certainty into digitalised decision-making processes, and the prevention of welfare fraud without undermining legitimate rights. Social law norms are connected to tax and company law incentives and to public procurement processes involving social and environmental requirements. Social law contains the regulatory framework governing the social safety net and support for individuals in vulnerable situations.

Methodically

Methodologically, LEST combines traditional legal analysis with law and economics, empirical legal studies, and regulatory analytics using text and data analysis of legal sources, case law, supervisory decisions and corporate, tax and procurement data. Through co-production with businesses, municipalities, regions and relevant authorities, the research is translated into scientific publications, policy briefs, contractual and governance frameworks, procedural tools and educational modules.

Taken together, LEST provides a coherent legal architecture in which tax law and the three core strengths of civil law, property law, company law and insolvency law, together with procedural and social law, deliver both theoretical depth and practical tools for a sustainable, digital and legally secure transition.