Islands of Deliberative Capacity in an Ocean of Authoritarian Control? The Deliberative Potential of Self-Organised Teams in Firms

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-35
Author(s):  
Alexander Krüger
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Democratic Deliberation ◽  
Control Structures ◽  
Deliberative System ◽  
Depth Interviews

Business firms play an increasingly influential role in contemporary societies, which has led many scholars to return to the question of the democratisation of corporate governance. However, the possibility of democratic deliberation within firms has received only marginal attention in the current debate. This article fills this gap in the literature by making a normative case for democratic deliberation at the workplace and empirically assessing the deliberative capacity of self-organised teams within business firms. It is based on sixteen in-depth interviews in six German firms which practice various forms of self-organised teamwork. The article argues that self-organised teamwork can create a space for authentic, inclusive, and consequential deliberation by suspending authoritarian control structures within business firms. Finally, the article proposes the consideration of firms not only as necessary parts of a larger deliberative system but also as deliberative systems in themselves.

scholarly journals Corporate Governance, Economic Entrenchment, and Growth

2005 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 655-720 ◽  
Author(s):  
Randall Morck ◽  
Daniel Wolfenzon ◽  
Bernard Yeung
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Capital Investment ◽  
Corporate Control ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
Institutional Development ◽  
The United States ◽  
Firm Level ◽  
Control Structures ◽  
Resource Misallocation ◽  
Property Rights Protection

Outside the United States and the United Kingdom, large corporations usually have controlling owners, who are usually very wealthy families. Pyramidal control structures, cross shareholding, and super-voting rights let such families control corporations without making a commensurate capital investment. In many countries, a few such families end up controlling considerable proportions of their countries' economies. Three points emerge. First, at the firm level, these ownership structures, because they vest dominant control rights with families who often have little real capital invested, permit a range of agency problems and hence resource misallocation. If a few families control large swaths of an economy, such corporate governance problems can attain macroeconomic importance—affecting rates of innovation, economywide resource allocation, and economic growth. If political influence depends on what one controls, rather than what one owns, the controlling owners of pyramids have greatly amplified political influence relative to their actual wealth. This influence can distort public policy regarding property rights protection, capital markets, and other institutions. We denote this phenomenon economic entrenchment, and posit a relationship between the distribution of corporate control and institutional development that generates and preserves economic entrenchment as one possible equilibrium. The literature suggests key determinants of economic entrenchment, but has many gaps where further work exploring the political economy importance of the distribution of corporate control is needed.

scholarly journals Ownership and control structure, corporate governance and income smoothing in Brazil

2011 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 180-192
Author(s):  
Damiana Torres ◽  
Adriano Leal Bruni ◽  
Antonio Lopo Martinez ◽  
Miguel Angel Rivera-Castro
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Earnings Management ◽  
Control Structure ◽  
Stock Exchange ◽  
Income Smoothing ◽  
General Category ◽  
Control Structures ◽  
And Control ◽  
Nonfinancial Firms ◽  
Majority Shareholder

Income smoothing is a longstanding practice under the more general category of earnings management. As the name suggests, it consists of smoothing out the fluctuations of the income series. This article examines the association between the ownership and control structure, level of corporate governance and origin of capital (foreign or domestic) of Brazilian companies on their propensity to smooth income. Using a sample of nonfinancial firms with shares traded on the São Paulo Stock Exchange (Bovespa) at the end of 2007, we performed covariance analysis based on data from the preceding ten years, where the dependent variable was the index proposed by Eckel, an empirical proxy for smoothing. The results indicate that the more concentrated the shareholding and control structures of Brazilian firms are, both according to overall capital and voting capital, the more intensely they tend to smooth earnings to favor the interests of the majority shareholder. The results also show that this effect is less pronounced for firms with enhanced corporate governance levels and those with foreign capital.

Company law and workers' interests

2005 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 179-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robbert van het Kaar
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Employee Participation ◽  
Company Law ◽  
The Other ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
European Directives ◽  
European Company ◽  
Cross Border ◽  
The One ◽  
Takeover Bids

Developments in company law in many cases have a significant impact on the interests of employees and their representatives. This article gives an overview of the implications of the 14 European directives and draft directives in this area. It also takes a closer look at the 13th Directive on public takeover bids, and goes on to examine developments in the field of corporate governance. What is the place for the workers in the current debate and the various codes of behaviour that have come into being? From the employee viewpoint the developments appear to be ambiguous. On the one hand, there are signs that employees are no longer regarded as serious stakeholders in the company. On the other, the 13th Directive, the proposed Tenth Directive on cross-border mergers, the SE (European Company) Directive on employee participation and other instruments make clear provision for participation by employee representatives.

This Obscure Thing Called Transparency

2022 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Media ◽  
International Experts ◽  
A Current

Transparency is the metaphor of our time. Whether in government or corporate governance, finance, technology, health or the media – it is ubiquitous today, and there is hardly a current debate that does not call for more transparency. But what does this word actually stand for and what are the consequences for the life of individuals? Can knowledge from the arts, and its play of visibility and invisibility, tell us something about the paradoxical logics of transparency and mediation? This Obscure Thing Called Transparency gathers contributions by international experts who critically assess the promises and perils of transparency today.

This Obscure Thing Called Transparency

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emmanuel Alloa
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Media ◽  
International Experts ◽  
A Current

Transparency is the metaphor of our time. Whether in government or corporate governance, finance, technology, health or the media – it is ubiquitous today, and there is hardly a current debate that does not call for more transparency. But what does this word actually stand for and what are the consequences for the life of individuals? Can knowledge from the arts, and its play of visibility and invisibility, tell us something about the paradoxical logics of transparency and mediation? This Obscure Thing Called Transparency gathers contributions by international experts who critically assess the promises and perils of transparency today.

The perceived relevance of tax risk-management in a South African context

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 82-94 ◽  
Author(s):  
Talya Gail Segal ◽  
Milton Segal ◽  
Warren Maroun
Keyword(s):  
Risk Management ◽  
Corporate Governance ◽  
South African ◽  
Academic Research ◽  
Small Sample ◽  
Integrated Reporting ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Control Structures ◽  
African Context ◽  
Perceived Relevance

Purpose Tax risk-management (TRM) is relatively understudied in the area of corporate governance and integrated reporting. The purpose of this study is to identify whether South African organisations identify, rank and manage tax risks in terms of importance and relevance to their own corporation. The study also aims to identify the link, if any, between TRM practices being implemented and the discussion and disclosure of these practices in the integrated report. Design/methodology/approach Detailed interviews with some of South Africa’s leading tax and corporate governance experts are used to highlight the TRM practices currently in place, as well as the evolution of these practices. These interviews also identify the connection between the practices and the integrated reporting disclosures. Findings The experts interviewed have identified a sound understanding of TRM practices in place and certainly some evolution of these practices over the past five years. What has been identified though is the need for further enhancement and incorporation of TRM practices into the corporate governance control structures within organisations. Integrated reporting disclosure of TRM still appears to be an area where there is need for improvement, specifically a better understanding by companies of how to use their integrated reports as a strategic asset of the company as opposed to merely a compliance exercise. Research limitations/implications The research relies on a relatively small sample of subject experts and does not provide a complete account of TRM developments. Originality/value The study adds value by contributing to research conducted on TRM. Although there has been research on ERM from a corporate governance perspective, few studies have examined this from a tax perspective, and there is virtually no formal academic research on the relationship between TRM and corporate governance from a South African perspective.

scholarly journals Who Talks and Who Listens? How Political Involvement Influences the Potential for Democratic Deliberation in Everyday Political Talk

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lea Gärtner ◽  
Alexander Wuttke ◽  
Harald Schoen
Keyword(s):  
Political Involvement ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Democratic Deliberation ◽  
Partisan Polarization ◽  
Step Model ◽  
Everyday Talk ◽  
Deliberative System ◽  
Political Talk ◽  
Citizen Deliberation ◽  
Political Groups

In times of rising partisan polarization and increasing disenchantment with political elites, everyday political talk could constitute an important venue for citizen deliberation. Everyday political discussions offer ordinary people opportunities to strengthen deliberative skills, form considered preferences ,and hone political identities in relation to others. However, informal political discussions seldom follow the norms of formal deliberative fora, calling into question how often such everyday talk really enables democratic deliberation in the broader public. The answer is essential to assess the deliberative potential of everyday political talk and thus to understand its role in the deliberative system. Focusing on the democratic and deliberative standards of reason-giving, mutual respect, equality, and inclusion, we develop a multi-step model of democratic deliberation in everyday political talk, in which the potential for democratic deliberation depends on the presence of all four core standards. As individuals’ propensity for democratic deliberation is likely to vary with their level of political involvement, both in terms of how much they care about politics and how strongly they identify with political groups, we consider both dimensions when modeling democratic deliberation in individuals’ everyday political discussions. We test all steps of the model with data from a large panel survey tracing the informal political discussion networks of 18,079 German voters during the year leading up to the national elections in 2017. Our findings indicate that everyday political talk is more deliberative than expected, as the three core standards of democratic deliberation we can measure are largely upheld in people’s political exchanges.

scholarly journals Majority Rule vs. Consensus: The Practice of Democratic Deliberation in the Greek Poleis

2018 ◽  
pp. 101-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mirko Canevaro
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Majority Rule ◽  
Current Work ◽  
Wide Spread ◽  
Athenian Democracy ◽  
Democratic Deliberation ◽  
Deliberative System ◽  
Near Unanimity

Scholars have often identified the Greek polis, and Athenian democracy in particular, as the first example of majority rule. This chapter reviews the evidence for Greek deliberative procedures and reassesses how much they conformed to majority rule, and how much they made use of consensus‐deliberation, understood through engagement with current work on deliberative democracy. It discusses the evidence of Hellenistic decrees from the Greek poleis for which we have voting figures, to show that what we find is for the most part unanimity or near‐unanimity. It then discusses the Athenian evidence to reassess whether the deliberative system in Athens practiced strict majority rule, or left space for considerable consensus seeking and even unanimity. It argues that consensus‐ based forms of deliberation were a key element of Greek decision making, which secured the cohesion of Greek communities as well as the synthesis of wide‐spread knowledge.

Employee Stock Ownership in Morocco

2022 ◽  
pp. 146-159
Author(s):  
Asmaa Boukhima ◽  
Tahar Khallouki
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Corporate Social Responsibility ◽  
Social Responsibility ◽  
Stock Ownership ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Legal Doctrine ◽  
Employee Stock Ownership ◽  
Legal Science ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Corporate Social

Today, the notion of social interest occupies an essential place in legal science. For a long time limited to the shareholders' own interests, today a large part of the legal doctrine insists on the necessity to take into consideration all the interests that contribute to the prosperity of the company, such as its employees, its suppliers, its customers. This is the sense in which the current debate on corporate governance and CSR (corporate social responsibility) is heading. In the context of this study, attention will be focused on the case of the employee. How does one take into consideration the interest of the latter in the company? Both forms of involvement are important, but the authors limit themselves to the second one, namely employee stock ownership.

The impact of EU accession on corporate governance reform in Bulgaria

2007 ◽  
Vol 57 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-190
Author(s):  
D. Ialnazov
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Information Disclosure ◽  
Institutional Context ◽  
Governance Reform ◽  
Eu Accession ◽  
Public Companies ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
The Eu

Since the start of its post-socialist transformation in 1989, Bulgaria has imported a large number of formal institutions from advanced market economies, including the EU-15. However, the adoption of EU and other international rules has not been effective due to weak enforcement and application by domestic actors such as the securities regulator, courts, and company owners/managers. The failures of corporate governance in Bulgaria until the early 2000s can be attributed to the broad institutional context (the lack of rule of law) as well as the creation of quasi-public companies as a result of the first wave of mass privatisation (1996–97). Since 2002, information disclosure and protection of shareholder rights have improved significantly. The article examines the proposition that this is partly due to the prospect of EU accession, which has certainly influenced the attitudes and expectations of domestic actors. Based on company surveys and in-depth interviews, the paper analyses how the securities regulator and company owners/managers have been adapting to the imported formal rules.

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