The Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002 established new regulations concerning the
treatment of whistleblowing employees and lawyers. The main objective for
these new mechanisms was to prevent further corporate scandals as recently
happened in the USA. Employees and lawyers are supposed to contribute an
important part in terms of monitoring corporate conduct. This essay traces
the reasons behind the critique of whistleblowing regulations under the Sarbanes-
Oxley Act 2002. It shows that the newly adopted rules are not capable
of establishing a working concept for monitoring corporations 'from the inside'.
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act does not provide sufficient protection for employees
who blow the whistle against retaliations by their employers. It failed
to establish procedures to ensure that whistleblowing will no longer be
ignored. Furtehermore, this essay shows that the current requirements for
lawyers are not effective in terms of monitoring corporate conduct. Lawyers
will most likely stay reluctant to disclose confidential information. The essay
shows that outside reporting rules for lawyers significantly endanger the
attorney-client privilege and cause considerable problems for non-US lawyers.
At the bottom, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act failed to establish a working regime of
the promising idea to monitor corporate conduct from the inside.