Private Firms and Corporate Governance An Integra

Authors: Lorraine Uhlaner Mike Wright Morten Huse

Publish Date: 2007/04/06

Volume: 29, Issue: 3, Pages: 225-241

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Abstract

This article provides a definition of corporate␣governance and highlights the challenges in adapting understanding of governance to the privatelyheld firm We emphasize the need to develop the scope of governance in privatelyheld firms beyond the traditional agency theory focus in the financial economics literature relating to large publiclylisted corporations There is a need to draw on and integrate an array of theoretical perspectives from both economics and other social science disciplines as well We present a schematic model of corporate governance which places the contributions presented in the special issue in context and which serves as a guide to highlighting gaps in the research base We review the principal issues relating to corporate governance in privatelyheld firms which relate to governance in different organizational contexts institutional context the industrial sector within which the firm finds itself the ownership context of the firm and the stage within the firm’s lifecycle the scope of corporate governance and other internal governance mechanisms to be considered We identify areas for further research on corporate governance in privatelyheld firms with respect to processes of governance organizational contexts assumptions about the owners executive remuneration financial reporting the nature of the dependent variable relating to the expected outcome of different approaches to governance and various methodological issues We suggest a need to develop governance codes for privatelyheld firms that are flexible enough to take account of the different types of governance needs of firms at different stages in their lifecycleThis article is published under an open access license Please check the Copyright Information section for details of this license and what reuse is permitted If your intended use exceeds what is permitted by the license or if you are unable to locate the licence and reuse information please contact the Rights and Permissions team

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