Transparency of Information in Insolvency Law: Between Preventive Imperatives and Protection Requirements

Abstract

This article explores the place of information transparency within Moroccan insolvency law, with particular attention to the treatment of financially distressed companies. The issue is not merely procedural. In collective proceedings, information often determines the practical balance between business rescue, creditor protection, and the preservation of economic activity. The study argues that transparency should be understood as a structuring legal mechanism. It shapes the conduct of insolvency proceedings and affects their legitimacy in concrete terms. The analysis relies mainly on Book V of the Moroccan Commercial Code, notably after the reform introduced by Law No. 73-17, together with selected doctrinal writings. The paper shows that transparency serves several functions at once. It facilitates access to information that is reliable, usable, and sufficiently timely for the actors involved in the proceedings — creditors, debtors, employees, judicial authorities, and potential acquirers. More discreetly perhaps, it also limits informational imbalances that frequently distort collective procedures in practice. Moroccan insolvency law, however, does not organize a perfectly equal circulation of information. The system operates through differentiated access, largely dependent on the procedural position of each participant. That distinction matters. It reflects less a logic of formal equality than one of functional adjustment. The article therefore proposes a reading of transparency that goes beyond disclosure obligations alone. Transparency appears, rather, as one of the underlying principles through which insolvency governance is organized and justified.