Institutions and Corporate Governance

Abstract

The last decades have witnessed a growing interest in the corporate governance and authority structures in organizations, a field that spans several disciplines, including economics, management, finance, accounting, and sociology. Much of the theoretical and empirical work in this field relies on institutional arguments, suggesting that corporate governance systems are embedded in larger institutional and legal frameworks, and that effective practices are highly contingent on the institutional environment in which corporations and their stakeholders operate. In this chapter, I trace the role of institutional arguments in the current literature on corporate governance both at the firm-level and the level of the economy, pointing out linkages and ongoing debates as well as promising avenues for future research.