From Cadbury to Kay: discourse, intertextuality and the evolution of UK corporate governance
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal
ISSN: 0951-3574
Article publication date: 11 June 2018
Issue publication date: 19 June 2018
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to answer two main research questions. First, the authors ask the degree to which the UK corporate governance code has changed in response to both systemic perturbations and the subsequent enquiries established to recommend solutions to perceived shortcomings. Second, the authors ask how the solutions proposed in these landmark governance texts might be explained.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors take a critical discourse approach to develop and apply a discourse model of corporate governance reform. The authors draw together data on popular, corporate-political and technocratic discourses on corporate governance in the UK and analyse these data using content analysis and the historical discourse approach.
Findings
The UK corporate governance code has changed little despite periodic crises and the enquiries set up to investigate and make recommendation. Institutional stasis, the authors find, is the product of discourse capture and control by elite corporate actors aided by political allies who inhabit the same elite habitus. Review group members draw intertextually on prior technocratic discourse to create new canonical texts that bear the hallmarks of their predecessors. Light touch regulation by corporate insiders thus remains the UK approach.
Originality/value
This is one of the first applications of critical discourse analysis in the accounting literature and the first to have conducted a discursive analysis of corporate governance reports in the UK. The authors present an original model of discourse transitions to explain how systemic challenges are dissipated.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Dedication: this article is dedicated by Michael Price, Charles Harvey and Mairi Maclean to the memory of their co-author Professor David J Campbell (1963-2017), who sadly passed away whilst the article was under first revision. David was a loyal and generous friend whose wit and infectious personality lit up the research process. His dedication, intellectual honesty and bravery continue to inspire.
Citation
Price, M., Harvey, C., Maclean, M. and Campbell, D. (2018), "From Cadbury to Kay: discourse, intertextuality and the evolution of UK corporate governance", Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 31 No. 5, pp. 1542-1562. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAAJ-01-2015-1955
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited