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The study aims at reviewing a synthesis of disclosure, transparency, and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) implementation in an attempt to provide directions for future research. Prior research overwhelmingly supports that the IFRS adoption or effective implementation of IFRS will enhance high-quality financial reporting, transparency, enhance the country’s investment environment, and foreign direct investment (FDI) (Dayanandan, Donker, Ivanof, & Karahan, 2016; Gláserová, 2013; Muniandy & Ali, 2012). However, some researchers provide conflicting evidence that developing countries implementing IFRS are probably not going to encounter higher FDI inflows (Gheorghe, 2009; Lasmin, 2012). It has also been argued that the IFRS adoption decreases the management earnings in countries with high levels of financial disclosure. In general, the study indicates that the adoption of IFRS has improved the financial reporting quality. The common law countries have strong rules to protect investors, strict legal enforcement, and high levels of transparency of financial information. From the extensive structured review of literature using the Scopus database tool, the study reviewed 105 articles, and in particular, the topic-related 94 articles were analysed. All 94 articles were retrieved from a range of 59 journals. Most of the articles (77 of 94) were published 2010–2018. The top five journals based on the citations are Journal of Accounting Research (187 citations), Abacus (125 citations), European Accounting Review (107 citations), Journal of Accounting and Economics (78 citations), and Accounting and Business Research (66 citations). The most-cited authors are Daske, Hail, Leuz, and Verdi (2013); Daske and Gebhardt (2006); and Brüggemann, Hitz, and Sellhorn (2013). Surprisingly, 65 of 94 articles did not utilise the theory. In particular, four theories have been used frequently: agency theory (15), economic theory (5), signalling theory (2), and accounting theory (2). The study calls for future research on the theoretical implications and policy-related research on disclosure and transparency which may inform the local and international standard setters.

In the aftermath of the global financial crisis, transparency became a rhetorical token used to provide a solution to financial problems. This study examines how transparency materialized in the context of the European securitization industry, which was largely blamed for the credit crunch. The authors show that although transparency was broadly associated with a political call for financial system reform, in the European securitization industry it provided the basis on which to repurpose its market infrastructure. The authors introduce the concept of transparency work to show that transparency is a market achievement organized as a standardization network of heterogeneous actors aiming at establishing a new calculative infrastructure for managing credit risk. Combining insights from information infrastructure research and Economic Sociology, the authors contribute to a distributed and networked understanding of information infrastructure development.

The lexicon of corporate governance has ‘transparency’ as a key imperative. Yet transparency as a management principle begs explanation. It also raises several questions: transparent to whom, how and why? Who decides? Is full transparency desirable? What are its merits and benefits? What are the risks of increased transparency? The answers may lie somewhere between the shareholder and stakeholder views of the modern corporation, with the former defending shareholder-owner primacy and firm profit-maximisation, and the latter offering a values-based approach towards balancing the needs and expectations of all stakeholders. While corporate governance broadly addresses the needs of shareholders and investors, driven by the position that companies need to be better governed for stockholder value, the ‘stakeholder’ view of the corporation has gained ground over the past 20 or so years whereby the modern corporation is accountable not only to its owners, but also society.The transparency debate has emerged in parallel, and with it, issues of privacy and/or secrecy on one hand and the notion of ‘sunlight’ on the other. Transparency’s role has been variously described as the promotion of corporate disclosure and protection of the rights of minority shareholders in the information environment (Bushman & Smith, 2003); the promotion of corporate accountability and advancement of the rights of stakeholders (Clarke, 2004; Donaldson & Preston, 1995; Hess, 2007; Mallin, 2002); a tool to limit information asymmetries (Boatright, 2008; Florini, 2007a, 2007b; Hood, 2006; Lev, 1992); a means to create a level playing field through ethics and fairness (Boatright, 2008; Oliver, 2004); the promotion of market efficiency (Bessire, 2005; Heflin, Subramanyam, & Zhang, 2003); and the prevention of abuse through stakeholder activism (Bandsuch, Pate, & Thies, 2008; Roche, 2005). Aspirations aside, there is lack of consensus as to transparency's dimensions, drivers and dilemmas in corporate behaviour. Indeed, its perceived value to stakeholders and corporations alike remains questionable. In this chapter, the author discusses the governance of corporate transparency and argues that clarity and Board policy are needed to manage transparency activism and its resultant risks.

Can transparency mitigate the trade-distortive effects of nontariff measures (NTMs)? This chapter explores the trade impact associated with promoting greater transparency in NTMs, using a new database of transparency provisions in over 100 Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs). The investigation surveys the incidence and scope of transparency provisions in RTAs, and econometrically assesses the trade effects of these instruments on bilateral agricultural and food trade. The findings demonstrate that transparency provisions in RTAs are associated with greater agricultural trade flows, suggesting that transparency should remain an important element of ongoing policy efforts to make NTMs less onerous for trade in agriculture.

This work provides an empirical analysis to determine whether directors’ compensation is lower (“transparency control effect” and “transparency deterrent effect”) or higher (“effects of transparency on increasing competition in pay”) among firms with greater transparency in terms of directors’ compensation.

A disclosure index about board compensation and different models based on linear panel-data regression have been developed, on a sample of 73 Spanish firms for the period 2007–2012.

Our results suggest that disclosure on pay strategy to directors leads to an increase in directors’ compensation, therefore, in this case, the effect of transparency on increasing competition in pay seems to prevail. Conversely, the disclosure on individual directors’ compensation and payment leads to a decrement in directors’ compensation, prevailing the transparency control effect and transparency deterrent effect.

The results of this study might be of interest to investors (to take into account these effects before they implement additional corporate governance reforms) and regulators (to be aware of the importance of this issue).

First, we study the effect that transparency and voluntary disclosure regarding board compensation has on the level of directors’ compensation. Second, in this study we go one step further in the transparency of board compensation disclosures by constructing a disclosure index. Finally, the results contribute to the necessary debate that is currently taking place in the Spanish, European and international context regarding this issue.

Purpose – Motivated by new models of nonprofit organizations, we study a voluntary contributions environment in which the productivity of the public goods process is chosen endogenously by a manager. The experimental treatments incorporate two institutions of transparency in the organization, which we conjecture will assist the manager in achieving an outcome superior to the standard free-riding prediction.

Methodology – The chapter uses the methodology of laboratory experimental economics.

Findings – The findings demonstrate that transparency institutions can be important for assisting the manager and the stakeholders achieve relative stable and efficient outcomes.

Limitations – We discuss obvious areas for further investigation including environments in which firm productivity is only stochastically related to the decisions of the manager.

Practical and Social Implications – The chapter is oriented to real-world issues in the organization of nonprofit enterprises, which were a once ubiquitous and now re-emerging source of charitable activity. The chapter is written so that it should be accessible to informed practitioners in nonprofit organizations.

Originality – The study of endogenous environments and institutions in the provision of charitable and public goods is a relatively new advance and is indeed the theme of Research in Experimental Economics, Volume 13, “Charity with Choice.”

The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of corporate governance (focused on some key mechanisms as board size, board independence, managerial ownership, institutional ownership, and chief executive officer duality) on financial analysts’ behavior in US. Results from panel data analysis for 294 US listed firms observed from 2007 to 2014 show that several attributes of the board of directors and audit committee have no effects on the number of analysts who are following the firm and the properties of analysts’ earnings forecasts. Findings also suggest that firms with independent and large boards and blockholders ownership benefit of more analyst following. In addition, it is proven that analysts’ earnings forecasts are optimistic and more accurate for companies where blockholder ownership, either by managers or external entities have larger quoted spreads but of lower quality for the ones which have greater independent board members and institutional investor’s holding.