International Corporate Governance

Corporate governance is the system of rules, practices and processes by which a company is directed and controlled. Corporate governance essentially involves balancing the interests of a company's many stakeholders, such as shareholders, management, customers, suppliers, financiers, government and the community. In an international context, these can be very different entities and governed by equally different cultural frameworks. This makes consideration of international comparative governance an important topic. Since corporate governance also provides the framework for attaining a company's objectives, it encompasses practically every sphere of management, from action plans and internal controls to performance measurement and corporate disclosure. National legal and political systems and associated institutional frameworks also impact on corporate governance, and closely associated financing arrangements, where these too exert influence over firm’s governance arrangements

Course leader

Professor Bruce Hearn

Target group

This course is open to anyone aged 18+

Course aim

By the end of this course a successful student should be able to:
1. Critically appraise the principal theoretical approaches common to the corporate governance literature, namely agency, stakeholder and transactions cost economics perspectives
2. Evaluate firm and management performance metrics commonly associated with governance outcomes (namely IPO underpricing and CEO/ Executive remuneration)
3. Critically evaluate the role of entrepreneurial founding CEO and executive teams in terms of human and social capital benefits to the firm
4. Critically assess the importance of institutional (legal) environments in shaping national corporate governance legislation
5. Critically assess the impact of institutional (legal) environments on the separation of ownership from control (i.e. on likelihood of firms participating in governance structures deviating from traditional diversified ownership model such as in business groups and extended family networks)
6. Evaluate the role and effectiveness of governance mechanisms in potentially averting financial crises and issues such as Enron and Worldcom collapses and in the recent financial crisis (2007-2009)