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China adopted an independent director system in 1997 in order to perfect company management structure in the country. The purpose of this paper is to assess the effectiveness of that system.

This paper starts from the current status of the independent director system in the country and gives comments on the independent nature and designation procedure of the independent directors, rationalization of the incentive system and completion of responsibility mechanism.

The unique function of the independent director system plays a decisive role in preventing control by people within a public company, minimizing power abuse by shareholders and best maintaining the interests of medium and small shareholders. But there still exists certain shortcomings in independent director system in China such as unclear of the independence nature, irrationality of designation method, incomplete incentive system and short of relative responsibility mechanism which restrict independent director system to be brought into full play.

Management of a company is always a hot topic in the company law and an independent director system is a very important aspect. On the basis of learning from advanced experience from the western world, China imported the independent director system to improve the management system of its companies. This paper analyses defects of the current independent director system in China and puts forward improvement measures.

In this study, we examine how ownership structure affects the use of independent directors in Vietnam – an emerging stock market.

We develop logit and tobit regression models to investigate the effects of ownership structure on the propensity to use independent directors and the number of independent directors on the board, respectively. Insider ownership and the use of independent directors are proposed to have a non-linear relationship.

With a sample of 1,318 observations collected from 192 listed firms over the period from 2008 to 2017, we find that insider ownership and independent director appointment have a U-shaped relationship. It is positive when insiders hold a small proportion of shares, and turns out to be negative when insiders hold a large percentage of shares. In addition, both state ownership and foreign ownership are negatively related to firm decisions of appointing independent directors.

Our findings imply that minority shareholders should have appropriate actions to reduce agency costs and protect their own interests. In addition, policymakers should improve the effectiveness of corporate governance legislation to increase the presence of independent directors in order to protect minority shareholders. Moreover, government agencies also need to increase the number of independent directors in state-controlled firms as a means to improve their corporate governance. Foreign investors may be a substitute for independent directors; therefore, firms without independent directors are able to improve their corporate governance by attracting foreign investors.

While the extant literature shows that independent directors can help firms decrease agency costs of equity in financial decisions and performance, there are relatively few studies investigating corporate decisions to use independent directors. This paper contributes to the literature of corporate governance mechanisms through independent directors in emerging markets.

This chapter analyzes and discusses the empirical results of the study. The discussion is organized under the following themes: independent director, audit committee, auditor independence, corporate code of conduct, adoption of IFRS, and measures for improvement. Three main findings emerge from the analysis. First, the current institutional environment does not yet fully support the Anglo-American practices. Second, in recent years the quality of financial reporting has improved considerably, which is largely attributable to strengthened accounting rules and regulations. However, the imported Anglo-American models of corporate governance and financial reporting, except for enhancing auditor independence, have had only a minor impact on financial reporting quality. Third, although the imported practices are not working as intended, the vast majority of interviewees stated that it was appropriate to move toward internationally acceptable principles and standards. Improving laws and regulations seems to be the main measure for rendering the institutional environment in China more supportive of Anglo-American models of corporate governance and financial reporting.

Professor independent directors have been the subject of academic debate as to whether they can improve corporate innovation performance. Accordingly, this paper aims to investigate the relationship between professor independent directors, the marketization process and corporate innovation performance in China.

Using a sample of Chinese A-share listed companies from 2014 to 2017, this study examines how professor independent directors and the (low and high) marketization process affect corporate innovation performance.

The empirical analysis of this yields the following main results. First, enterprises with a higher proportion of professor independent directors outperform those with a low proportion of professor independent directors in terms of corporate innovation. Second, the study of introducing the marketization process finds that there is no “market failure”. Third, while professor independent directors have a significant association with innovation performance in the high-marketization group, this association is negligible in the low-marketization group, indicating that there is no “substitution effect”.

This research provides empirical evidence to support the hiring of professors with relevant backgrounds as independent directors who can contribute meaningfully to corporate governance and innovation while also fostering industrial transformation. This study also identifies that the role of professor independent directors in facilitating corporate innovation is more effective in regions with a high degree of marketization than in regions with a low degree of marketization, implying that increasing marketization benefits the role of professor independent directors in facilitating corporate innovation.

This study investigates the impact of female directors on firms' financial performance by scrutinizing the different roles they are empowered to fulfill.

This study examines the impact of the roles performed by female directors on firms' financial performance using a panel dataset of the top 100 listed Indian firms over a period of 5 years. The study uses an appropriate panel data model for empirical analysis. For the robustness evaluation, a two-stage least square (2SLS) with the instrumental variable model were used.

The findings reveal a significantly positive impact of the total percentage of female directors on firms' financial performance. Further, by disentangling the impact of the total percentage of female directors between independent directors and executive directors, the study shows that independent female directors make a significant positive contribution to their firms' financial performance. By contrast, the performance impact of female executive directors was insignificant. In addition, the findings reveal that firms with a higher proportion of independent female directors outperform firms with a higher percentage of female executive directors.

This study is the first of its kind to unravel the performance impact of female directors and distinguish between the roles of independent directors and executive directors in the context of the emerging market of India, after the imposition of a gender quota for corporate boards.

We document the emergence of the Lead Independent Director (LID) board role in a sample of U.S. firms from 1999–2015. We find that firms that adopt an LID board role are larger and have more independent boards, higher institutional investor holdings, and an NYSE listing. Firms with greater anticipated benefits from monitoring also adopt an LID role, e.g., firms with dual CEO-Chairman, with more takeover defense mechanisms, and with higher cash holdings. Using an event study methodology, we find that investors respond positively to the adoption of an LID board role. Lastly, using instrumental variables to address endogeneity in the LID board role, we find that firms with an LID are more likely to terminate poorly performing CEOs. Taken as a whole, these results suggest that the LID board role enhances firm value and improves the quality of corporate governance.

This paper aims to explore the extent of adequacy and confidence that can be enjoyed by minority shareholders in the supervisory controls on Boards in listed companies in China.

This study draws upon the legislative controls and case‐studies in China.

Being the cornerstone of the development of capital markets, listed companies are in complementary relationship with the latter, which in turn serves as the financing tool for the former. Recently, the financial markets all over the world have been thrown into deep crisis and the financing functions of the domestic capital markets have almost been paralyzed. In this context, it is high time for us to exert more efforts to improve the institutional arrangements of the supervisory functions in the governance of listed companies in China, to strengthen corporate governance, to restrain the actions and behaviors of major shareholders, directors and the executives, to strengthen their concerned responsibilities, to put greater attention and more protection on the promotion of minor shareholders' confidence on capital markets, and to maintain the steady and sustainable development of capital markets in the long run.

This study and findings should be of interest to those seeking to assess the adequacy of minority protection in China.

Studies on corporate boards examine how social ties between the CEO and independent board members affect the effectiveness of board monitoring. Much evidence suggests that social connections between the CEO and independent directors are associated with inadequate monitoring and lower firm value (Hwang and Kim, 2009; Fracassi and Tate, 2012). In this study, the authors note that social connections of the independent directors are of different nature and thus should not be treated as a homogeneous group; that is, the nature of connections among directors can be quite different from that between the CEO and directors, which is the primary focus of previous studies.

The authors classify independent directors into four mutually exclusive groups based on their social connections to the CEO and other independent board members and examine what role each type of connection plays in corporate monitoring using panel data and cross-sectional fixed effect regressions.

The authors find that Only_CEO%, the proportion of independent directors who are connected only to the CEO, is negatively associated with monitoring intensity. Specifically, firms with higher Only_CEO% have larger CEO compensation, lower likelihood of dismissing the CEO, more co-opted board and worse firm performance. In contrast, No_CEO_Ind%, the proportion of independent directors who have no connection to either the CEO or other independent directors is associated with more effective monitoring. These findings suggest that independent directors with different degrees of social connections exhibit different monitoring qualities.

When more independent directors, who are connected exclusively to the CEO, are on the board, they consistently deliver low monitoring quality. However, when more independent directors with no connections to either the CEO or any independent directors are on the board, they enhance monitoring quality. These findings can be used to construct board structures with more effective monitoring ability.

This paper extends the literature on social networks in corporate finance. The authors show that independent directors with exclusive connections to other independent directors do not have a significant effect on board monitoring, but those truly independent directors are associated with better monitoring quality. These findings suggest that different types of social connections of independent directors play a different role in board monitoring and help extend our understanding of the function of social connections of independent directors in corporate governance.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between independent director military service and monitoring effectiveness, focusing on chief executive officer (CEO) compensation.

The authors identify independent directors with military experience using BoardEx data. The authors focus on the level of CEO compensation. The methods used include panel data estimation, propensity score matching analysis and instrumental variable analysis.

The authors find more powerful CEOs are more likely to appoint independent directors with past military service to the board. Boards with a larger proportion of independent directors with military experience tend to award higher levels of CEO compensation. Moreover, the positive relationship between independent directors with military experience and executive compensation is stronger when the CEO is more powerful.

This paper examines a relatively unexplored director background, directors with military experience, and finds this type of independent director is associated with weak monitoring. The authors contribute to the literature examining the effect of executive and board member military experience on corporations. The authors identify weak monitoring of powerful CEOs as a potential weakness of directors with military experience. This drawback should be considered before appointing a director with military experience to the board.

This paper sets out to explore the effects that the setting‐up of an independent director system has on the operating efficiency of information electronics companies in China.

This paper uses 87 Chinese listed electronics companies during the initial stages of the independent directors system from 1999 to 2002 as sample subjects, and employs a two‐stage procedure for empirical investigation.

The non‐parametric test results verify that there is no significant difference in the operating efficiency of Chinese electronics companies following the establishment of an independent director system. The Tobit regression results show that the establishment of an independent director system in the Chinese electronics industry does not influence overall technical efficiency (TE), pure technical efficiency (PE), or scale efficiency (SE).

Whether the related schemes of the current corporate governance structure practised in China can achieve their expected results, as well as the possible future development direction of the governance structure, is of the utmost importance, and is a research subject worth examining in greater depth.

It is of the utmost urgency for such corporate governance to improve the selection mechanism for independent directors, to establish incentives and responsibility‐taking mechanisms for independent directors, and to amend the company law and securities law to perfect the rules of an independent director system.

By using DEA and the Tobit regression model, this study attempts to investigate whether China, in addition to fraud prevention, has improved corporate operating efficiency by introducing a system of independent directors.