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To show that differences in the extent to which firms engage in unrelated diversification can be attributed to differences in ownership structure.

We draw on longitudinal data and use a panel analysis specification to test our hypotheses.

We find that unrelated diversification destroys value; pressure-sensitive Anglo-American owners in a firm’s equity reduce unrelated diversification, whereas pressure-resistant domestic owners increase unrelated diversification; the greater the firm’s free cash flow, the greater the negative effect of pressure-sensitive Anglo-American owners on unrelated diversification.

We contribute to corporate governance and strategy research by bringing in owners’ institutional origin as a shaper of owner preferences in particular with regards to unrelated diversification. Future research may expand our investigation to more than one home institutional context, and theorize on institutional origin effects beyond the dichotomy between Anglo-American and non-Anglo-American (not oriented toward shareholder value maximization) owners.

Policy makers, financial analysts, owners, and managers may want to reflect about the implications of ownership structure, as well as promoting or joining corporations with particular ownership configurations.

A shareholder value-destroying strategy, such as unrelated diversification has adverse consequences for society at large, in terms of opportunity costs, that is, resources could be allocated to value-creating activities instead. Promoting an ownership configuration that creates value should contribute to social welfare.

Owners may not be exclusively driven by shareholder value maximization, but can be influenced by normative beliefs (biases) stemming from the institutional context they originate from.

While there has been some convergence in corporate governance codes and securities regulations across the European Union (EU), the remaining areas of divergence are the most contentious as they reflect differences in fundamental societal norms and values. I propose that using the multinational corporation as the referent unit of analysis yields a means for making a qualitative distinction between the two regimes. I suggest that at least for firms with EU‐wide scope, certain critical elements of the German model may be more appropriate, as the neoclassical justifications of the Anglo‐American model are less reliable in such a setting.

Compares two corporate governance models: the Anglo‐American and the Continental European model. These corporate governance models differ strongly, and the differences are mainly due to differences in the business context. The problems arising from separation of ownership from control will thus have to be solved through different mechanisms. One important mechanism is the board of directors. The board composition of 122 companies has been analyzed in a Belgian empirical study. From the tests, finds a significant positive relationship between the number of directors in the board and a range of other factors. Shareholder structure does not seem to have an effect on the size of the board. A second variable concerning the composition of the board, is the percentage of external directors. Finds that the number of external directors differs significantly between companies with a different nationality and between companies that are listed or not. Size, shareholder structure and industry were not related to the percentage of external directors in a company.

The purpose of this paper is to present a case study of Curaçao as a small island coping with globalization and to contribute to the development of a framework to discuss globalization and corporate governance.

The paper starts to integrate three scenarios: globalization, the paradigmatic approach of corporate governance, and the categorization of organizations. This framework is then applied to the case of Curaçao.

Globalization of Curaçao involves the introduction of the Anglo‐American model of governance into several actors. This is a major change that the society finds difficult adapting to. A significant part of the population is at risk of being excluded.

The paper contributes to a multi‐paradigm approach to corporate governance, and in analyzing the globalization of small islands.

Asian economy in transition is facing great deal of challenges, so its corporate governance. This paper investigates the dominant corporate governance models practiced under the liberal market capitalism, cooperative capitalism, collective capitalism and the state capitalism across the continents and proposes conscious governance approach for Asia and emerging economies.

The paper explores and compares Anglo-American and Continental European corporate governance models. The report further investigates the development of corporate governance across Asian publicly listed companies, state-owned enterprises, small and medium enterprises and other privately held large enterprises, and raises questions and concerns and derives conclusion.

The Asian experience of imposing Western corporate governance models is more of a simplification of tasks based on political, cultural and globalization needs rather than the regions’ economic, financial and social development reality.

The unique proposition of conscious corporate governance aligns corporate governance practice with Asian socio-economic transition vision and helps with further development and reforms.

The paper adds to the existing efforts and triggers a fresh view to the Asian and emerging economies corporate governance research and strategy.

This paper aims to examine whether corporate social responsibility (CSR) is associated with firms’ earnings quality (EQ) and how this association is context-specific. The authors consider specific institutional differences in strength of corporate governance (CG) attributes, quality of law enforcement and level of investor protection found between Anglo-American, European and South-Eastern Asian CG models to test the impact of above country-level factors on this association.

To test the association between CSR and EQ, the authors consider EIRIS (Ethical Investment Research Service) (2018) CSR issues of sustainability indicators as proxy to capture CSR. Following Rezaee and Tuo’s (2019) study, the authors classify EQ into innate earnings quality (IEQ) and discretionary earnings quality (DEQ). The authors investigate the innate (discretionary) EQ as to refer to firm’s inherent operating uncertainty (earnings management). Several dependency models for panel data applying the generalized method of moment (GMM) estimator of Arellano and Bond (1991) are ruled based on archival data of 4,206 non-financial international listed firms over the period 2012-2017.

Univariate and GMM multivariate cross-country analyses show that CSR is positively associated with EQ and that this association is more pronounced for firms within countries where good CG tools and higher investor right protection are preserved. The authors interpret the findings as evidence that the CSR-EQ association is shaped by the degree of monitoring role played by institutional features at the country level. The results are robust to a battery of robustness tests.

The originality of this research is twice. On the one hand, it examines whether CSR is a reflection of manager’s ethical opportunistic behavior resultant on earnings quality derived from a firm’s innate traits. On the second hand, it tests whether CSR is a reflection of discretionary earnings quality manifested by earnings management behavior. This paper is the first to support that institutional features significantly matter when investigating the association between CSR and EQ.

Whether corporate governance systems and practices are converging to the Anglo-American shareholder-value-oriented model or continue to diverge from this model and maintain their idiosyncrasies has been controversially debated among scholars in a variety of academic disciplines. The purpose of this paper is to review, critique and integrate the disparate positions in the convergence-divergence debate in corporate governance and to suggest promising directions for future research.

The author constructs a theoretical framework in which convergence and divergence dynamics are conceptualized as simultaneous processes of institutional change and continuity. This framework takes into account the influence of economic market forces, social embeddedness and cultural forces in shaping corporate governance at the national and the firm levels and provides a holistic and integrative perspective on the extant literature in the convergence-divergence debate.

The literature review does not support either the predictions of convergence advocates or the predictions of divergence advocates. Instead, the paper finds that convergence and divergence dynamics can coexist and lead to increasing heterogeneity in corporate governance arrangements of firms within and between corporate governance systems. This finding adds complexity to the debate and opens room for interesting research directions.

The paper offers a comprehensive review of the topic and draws from literature in financial economics, comparative law, economic sociology, international business, political science and strategic management. Most importantly, the paper offers a multi-theoretical framework that allows for an integration of the divergent perspectives presented in the literature.

This paper aims to analyse the link between culture and corporate governance. In particular, it demonstrates the impact of culture in inhibiting convergence of corporate governance. Overall, the paper provides an appraisal of corporate governance laws in stakeholder-oriented states that have endured market pressure for convergence.

The paper utilises historical trend in analyzing changes in corporate governance regulation in six countries covering three continents with stakeholder-oriented corporate governance model to determine the effect of culture in the convergence or divergence of corporate governance.

The view that corporate governance is converging towards the shareholder model largely ignores cultural differences in states. An appraisal of corporate governance rules and principles that have endured Anglo-American influence reveals a strong propensity for cultural norms to dictate areas where changes occur. This paper demonstrates nominal changes in corporate governance regulation and ideologies, as states still turn to design corporate governance rules around their cultural philosophy. The paper also reveals weak political authority for convergence vis-à-vis market forces.

Laws are strongly embedded in the corporate philosophies of states. Thus, the market and managers need to incorporate national culture into corporate practices for effective implementation.

Few studies have examined the effect of culture on the convergence of corporate governance regulation, especially across different countries. This study does not only analyze corporate governance in developed countries but also examines emerging nations in Africa where research on convergence is very scarce.

Albeit the growing academic research on emerging economies corporate governance (CG) environments within accounting and finance literature, there exists a dearth of cross-country studies using a qualitative approach to understand practitioners’ behaviour vis-a-vis diffusion of international CG practices in emerging economies. This study aims to fill this oversight through a comparative analysis of the divergence and convergence of CG systems operational in three emerging economies (Cameroon, Kenya and Pakistan) while highlighting different institutional and contextual impacts on behaviour of governance actors. The paper uses an interface between critical realism and new institutional economics theory to explore the implementation and execution of CG in Cameroon, Kenya and Pakistan.

The study analysed 24 in-depth semi-structured interviews and conducted with key governance practitioners across the three countries.

The findings show that CG implementation processes in Cameroon, Kenya and Pakistan are nascent and driven by international forces rather than local initiatives. CG lacks institutional identity across the three countries as regulatory coercion acts as a key driver for CG adoption and practitioner accounts are mixed regarding the impact of CG on firm performance.

The paper evidences that the lack of governance identify, compliance and slow implementation process of governance regulations and its impact on firm performance in emerging economies is caused by the fact that local institutional characteristics prevalent in these economies may not be suitable for a “copy and paste” of Western form of governance regulations. Furthermore, governance actors do not see the relevance of recommended CG practices except as a regulatory burden.

The paper contributes to close the lacuna in the seemingly little qualitative comparative study that has examined practitioner’s perception vis-à-vis the diffusion of international governance practices in emerging economies. Specifically, it uncovers how different institutional and contextual factors impact on the behaviour of governance actors and how their behaviours may constrain adoption, implementation and compliance with recommended governance practices.

World population is expected to increase by some 2.6 billion from 6.9 billion in 2010 to more than 9.5 billion by mid-century. Most of this population increase will occur in the developing nations, and most of this increase will be absorbed in the rapidly expanding metropolitan regions of these countries – the so-called megacities of the twenty-first century (United Nations, 2009). And as urban development accelerates across the globe, most of the population increase will occur in the emerging megacities and other metropolitan areas in Africa, Asia and South America. Because the original areas of settlement in the city centre have long been established, much of the population increase in these metropolitan regions will occur in the suburban areas of cities in the Global South – areas of favelas and shanty towns alongside earlier middle-class and upper-class suburbs, newly planned gated communities and garden suburbs, and indigenous models of suburban growth that will emerge in the next century.