Corporate Governance: Soft Law Regulation and Disclosure—The Cases of the United Kingdom and South Africa

2017 ◽  
pp. 233-260
Author(s):  
Irene-Marie Esser
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Corporate Governance ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Soft Law ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Law Regulation

scholarly journals A comparative analysis of strengths and weaknesses of corporate governance practices between two jurisdictions; UK and South Africa

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
King Costa ◽  
Thelela Ngcetane-Vika
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Corporate Governance ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Best Practice ◽  
Stock Exchange ◽  
The Other ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Business Entities ◽  
The Uk

This paper is an exploration of theoretical aspects underpinning the practice of Corporate Governance (CG) in the United Kingdom and South Africa. Because of several corporate scandals and failures in the twenty and twenty first siècles, Corporate Governance has been a significant and crucial subject and field of study in business schools in recent years. Leadership and Management of business entities and alignment to prescripts that are statutory formulated for prevention of corporate decline and enhancement of sound business principles continue to be highly contentious issues. A theoretical and exploratory narrative synthesis was conducted to unearth the strengths and weaknesses of contextual explication, practice and legal application of Corporate Governance in both the United Kingdom and South Africa. In terms of the UK, the study found out that the CG is designed and benchmarked on international best practice, seamlessly fitting within all the Codes on Key Aspects of Corporate Governance. Secondly, another major element of strengths determination were found to be inherent in the practice of voluntary compliance. However, the greatest criticisms of Corporate Governance theories in the UK was the fact that their focus is largely on public corporations, especially those listed in London stock exchange and thus, leave behind small and medium enterprises. The cultural diversity is also found to be a cause for concern in terms of practice and legal application. On the other hand, in South Africa, the study found out that consideration for diversity is one of the greatest strengths in CG practice and legal application, which is likely to contribute effectively to good and sound decision-making, reflective of all people. Weaknesses continue to be the delay in realisation of board equity in terms of gender while on the other hand, corruption and lack of adherence to retributive prescripts remain problematic.

scholarly journals A Comparative Analysis of Director Tenure in South Africa and Selected International Jurisdictions

2021 ◽  
Vol 54 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rehana Cassim
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Hong Kong ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
South African ◽  
The South ◽  
Public Companies ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Governance Practices

Director tenure attracts attention worldwide and is increasingly being recognised as a crucial element in assessing an external (independent non-executive) director’s independence. Director tenure has recently come under the spotlight in South Africa. Shareholder activists are expressing disapproval of lengthy tenures of directors serving on boards of listed public companies and exerting pressure on long-serving directors to resign from office. This article examines whether the South African corporate governance principles regulating director tenure are adequate or in need of revision. The article examines further the corporate governance practices in leading jurisdictions such as the United Kingdom, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, and India that have recently revised their corporate governance practices. It then makes recommendations for enhancing the South African corporate governance approach to director tenure. It also calls on directors to collaborate with shareholders and independent external experts to examine their approach to director tenure and, if circumstances allow, revise the company’s memorandum of incorporation to limit directors’ tenure or provide for a staggered rotation of directors on the board.

scholarly journals Piercing the corporate veil: An incursion into the judicial conundrum

2015 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 136-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony O Nwafor
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Corporate Governance ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Judicial Discretion ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Corporate Entity ◽  
Piercing The Corporate Veil ◽  
A Company ◽  
Personal Liability ◽  
Personal Agenda

Once a company is incorporated, it enjoys, by the power of the law, a personality which is distinct from those of the incorporators. This invariably implies that those running the affairs of the company do not incur personal liability in the course of doing so. The same legal might which forms the basis for corporate existence also regulates its purpose to afford protection to those dealing with the company by ensuring that the controllers of those corporations do not use them to pursue improper personal agenda. The courts have shown the willingness to disregard the corporate entity and impose personal liabilities on the controllers when such improprieties occur. The paper examines the judicial authorities especially in South Africa and the United Kingdom. They reveal a significant level of inconsistencies in the exercise of this equitable power of the court. The paper further examines the recent legislative intervention in South Africa and argues that unless specific guidelines are provided by parliament on when the corporate veil could be pierced, the courts will continue to address this issue as a matter of judicial discretion and which is at the root of the inconsistent and conflicting judicial pronouncements in this vital area of corporate governance.

scholarly journals RIC in COVID-19—a Clinical Trial to Investigate Whether Remote Ischemic Conditioning (RIC) Can Prevent Deterioration to Critical Care in Patients with COVID-19

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean M. Davidson ◽  
Kishal Lukhna ◽  
Diana A. Gorog ◽  
Alan D. Salama ◽  
Alejandro Rosell Castillo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Clinical Trial ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Inflammatory Cytokines ◽  
In Vitro Cytotoxicity ◽  
Cytokine Storm ◽  
Remote Ischemic Conditioning ◽  
Ischemic Conditioning ◽  
The United Kingdom

Abstract Purpose Coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) has, to date, been diagnosed in over 130 million persons worldwide and is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Several variants of concern have emerged including those in the United Kingdom, South Africa, and Brazil. SARS-CoV-2 can cause a dysregulated inflammatory response known as a cytokine storm, which can progress rapidly to acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), multi-organ failure, and death. Suppressing these cytokine elevations may be key to improving outcomes. Remote ischemic conditioning (RIC) is a simple, non-invasive procedure whereby a blood pressure cuff is inflated and deflated on the upper arm for several cycles. “RIC in COVID-19” is a pilot, multi-center, randomized clinical trial, designed to ascertain whether RIC suppresses inflammatory cytokine production. Methods A minimum of 55 adult patients with diagnosed COVID-19, but not of critical status, will be enrolled from centers in the United Kingdom, Brazil, and South Africa. RIC will be administered daily for up to 15 days. The primary outcome is the level of inflammatory cytokines that are involved in the cytokine storm that can occur following SARS-CoV-2 infection. The secondary endpoint is the time between admission and until intensive care admission or death. The in vitro cytotoxicity of patient blood will also be assessed using primary human cardiac endothelial cells. Conclusions The results of this pilot study will provide initial evidence on the ability of RIC to suppress the production of inflammatory cytokines in the setting of COVID-19. Trial Registration NCT04699227, registered January 7th, 2021.

scholarly journals A cross-sectional survey assessing the influence of theoretically informed behavioural factors on hand hygiene across seven countries during the COVID-19 pandemic

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
K. A. Schmidtke ◽  
K. G. Drinkwater
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Hand Hygiene ◽  
Behaviour Change ◽  
Surface Cleaning ◽  
Behaviour Change Techniques ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Surface Areas ◽  
The United Kingdom

Abstract Background Human hygiene behaviours influence the transmission of infectious diseases. Changing maladaptive hygiene habits has the potential to improve public health. Parents and teachers can play an important role in disinfecting surface areas and in helping children develop healthful handwashing habits. The current study aims to inform a future intervention that will help parents and teachers take up this role using a theoretically and empirically informed behaviour change model called the Capabilities-Opportunities-Motivations-Behaviour (COM-B) model. Methods A cross-sectional online survey was designed to measure participants’ capabilities, opportunities, and motivations to [1] increase their children’s handwashing with soap and [2] increase their cleaning of surface areas. Additional items captured how often participants believed their children washed their hands. The final survey was administered early in the coronavirus pandemic (May and June 2020) to 3975 participants from Australia, China, India, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and the United Kingdom. Participants self-identified as mums, dads, or teachers of children 5 to 10 years old. ANOVAs analyses were used to compare participant capabilities, opportunities, and motivations across countries for handwashing and surface disinfecting. Multiple regressions analyses were conducted for each country to assess the predictive relationship between the COM-B components and children’s handwashing. Results The ANOVA analyses revealed that India had the lowest levels of capability, opportunity, and motivation, for both hand hygiene and surface cleaning. The regression analyses revealed that for Australia, Indonesia, and South Africa, the capability component was the only significant predictor of children’s handwashing. For India, capability and opportunity were significant. For the United Kingdom, capability and motivation were significant. Lastly, for Saudi Arabia all components were significant. Conclusions The discussion explores how the Behaviour Change Wheel methodology could be used to guide further intervention development with community stakeholders in each country. Of the countries assessed, India offers the greatest room for improvement, and behaviour change techniques that influence people’s capability and opportunities should be prioritised there.

The global effectiveness of fact-checking: Evidence from simultaneous experiments in Argentina, Nigeria, South Africa, and the United Kingdom

2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (37) ◽  
pp. e2104235118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ethan Porter ◽  
Thomas J. Wood
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Health Outcomes ◽  
False Beliefs ◽  
Point Scale ◽  
Analytic Procedure ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Fact Checking ◽  
Checking Experiments

The spread of misinformation is a global phenomenon, with implications for elections, state-sanctioned violence, and health outcomes. Yet, even though scholars have investigated the capacity of fact-checking to reduce belief in misinformation, little evidence exists on the global effectiveness of this approach. We describe fact-checking experiments conducted simultaneously in Argentina, Nigeria, South Africa, and the United Kingdom, in which we studied whether fact-checking can durably reduce belief in misinformation. In total, we evaluated 22 fact-checks, including two that were tested in all four countries. Fact-checking reduced belief in misinformation, with most effects still apparent more than 2 wk later. A meta-analytic procedure indicates that fact-checks reduced belief in misinformation by at least 0.59 points on a 5-point scale. Exposure to misinformation, however, only increased false beliefs by less than 0.07 points on the same scale. Across continents, fact-checks reduce belief in misinformation, often durably so.

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