Alternative Mechanisms For Corporate Control

Why does corporate governance--front page news with the collapse of Enron, WorldCom, and Parmalat--vary so dramatically around the world? This book explains how politics shapes corporate governance--how managers, shareholders, and workers jockey for advantage in setting the rules by which companies are run, and for whom they are run. It combines a clear theoretical model on this political interaction, with statistical evidence from thirty-nine countries of Europe, Asia, Africa, and North and South America and detailed narratives of country cases. This book differs sharply from most treatments by explaining differences in minority shareholder protections and ownership concentration among countries in terms of the interaction of economic preferences and political institutions. It explores in particular the crucial role of pension plans and financial intermediaries in shaping political preferences for different rules of corporate governance. The countries examined sort into two distinct groups: diffuse shareholding by external investors who pick a board that monitors the managers, and concentrated blockholding by insiders who monitor managers directly. Examining the political coalitions that form among or across management, owners, and workers, the authors find that certain coalitions encourage policies that promote diffuse shareholding, while other coalitions yield blockholding-oriented policies. Political institutions influence the probability of one coalition defeating another.

This essay addresses some salient issues associated with corporate control. First, what determines the distribution of insider and outsider share ownership in the firm, and how does this distribution affect corporate performance? Second, how effective are board dismissals, proxy fights and takeovers as alternative corporate control mechanisms? Third, how do these alternative mechanisms interact, and what are the resulting incentives for boards of directors, managers, and takeover bidders? Fourth, do takeovers change underlying value, or do they merely redistribute wealth between affected parties? Finally, what explains the changes in supervision by boards of directors and through takeovers that occur over time?

The current crisis has rocked the financial system worldwide and has cast doubt on the effectiveness of the existing regulatory regime. Thousands of firms have gone bankrupt and many financial institutions were bailed out by governments. The effects of the crisis have shaken emerging and developing markets alike and have not spared neither small nor large businesses. Many scholars and practitioners attribute the roots of the crisis to failures and weaknesses in the way corporate governance has been practiced since the mid-1990s. Lax board oversight of top management, short-termism and self-interested behavior have been fingered as the culprits behind recent financial turmoil. This book highlights the recent developments and new trends in corporate governance. The eighteen chapters, written by leading academics and experts, can assist corporate executives, governance bodies, investors, market regulators, and policymakers in having a global picture of major corporate governance issues. This book highlights the recent developments and new trends in corporate governance. The eighteen chapters, written by leading academics and experts, can assist corporate executives, governance bodies, investors, market regulators, and policymakers in having a global picture of major corporate governance issues.

This book examines the effectiveness of corporate takeovers. The dominant ideologies of corporate takeovers include synergistic gains and its managerial disciplinary role. These dominant themes are being undermined by the challenges of costly acquisitions. The UK Takeover Code is a regulatory response to the role of managers of target companies only. Also, the regulatory framework for takeovers in the United States is largely focused on target companies. The book demonstrates that managements can influence the role of takeovers, thereby undermining its synergistic and disciplinary values. Presenting an identification and evaluation of the limits of current regulatory and judicial control over the role of management during takeovers in the UK and the US -Delaware, it will identify the relevance of institutional control as an effective mechanism for addressing the challenges of managerial influence over takeover functions. It will also identify how the role of managements can be addressed with the complementary benefit to shareholder and employee interests; thereby challenging the shareholder/ stakeholder primacy debate in corporate law, particularly in relation to takeovers. This book will be essential reading for scholars and students interested in the market for corporate control, corporate law and company law.

Even in the wake of the biggest financial crash of the postwar era, the United States continues to rely on Securities and Exchange Commission oversight and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which set tougher rules for boards, management, and public accounting firms to protect the interests of shareholders. Such reliance is badly misplaced. In Corporate Governance, Jonathan Macey argues that less government regulation--not more--is what's needed to ensure that managers of public companies keep their promises to investors. Macey tells how heightened government oversight has put a stranglehold on what is the best protection against malfeasance by self-serving management: the market itself. Corporate governance, he shows, is about keeping promises to shareholders; failure to do so results in diminished investor confidence, which leads to capital flight and other dire economic consequences. Macey explains the relationship between corporate governance and the various market and nonmarket institutions and mechanisms used to control public corporations; he discusses how nonmarket corporate governance devices such as boards and whistle-blowers are highly susceptible to being co-opted by management and are generally guided more by self-interest and personal greed than by investor interests. In contrast, market-driven mechanisms such as trading and takeovers represent more reliable solutions to the problem of corporate governance. Inefficient regulations are increasingly hampering these important and truly effective corporate controls. Macey examines a variety of possible means of corporate governance, including shareholder voting, hedge funds, and private equity funds. Corporate Governance reveals why the market is the best guardian of shareholder interests.