Developments in International Corporate Governance, Ethics and Social Responsibility

Review of Corporate Finance

Special Issue

Special Theme Handling Editors:

Giuliana Birindelli, University of Ferrara, Italy

Claudia Girardone, University of Essex, United Kingdom

Anna Sarkisyan, University of Essex, United Kingdom

Over the past few decades, the world has become more globalized and interconnected, but it has also become increasingly unpredictable and risky. This is evident through major events like the global financial crisis, the Covid-19 pandemic, and more recently, the conflict in Ukraine. Within the financial and corporate sector, high-profile scandals (Enron, Wells Fargo, and Theranos), along with other forms of misconduct like subprime mortgage mis-selling, the Libor fixing case, and the Volkswagen emissions affair, have exposed ethical and governance failures with far-reaching global repercussions affecting numerous stakeholders and industries.

Recent developments in international corporate governance have highlighted the importance of consistent standards of conduct across countries, stronger risk management frameworks, transparency, accountability, and effective internal controls and compliance. According to a recent survey (Fields and O’Kelley, 2023), the most pressing global corporate governance issues that boards and directors are expected to face in the near future include board quality, effectiveness, and composition; levels and types of executive compensation; and increased stakeholder demand for sustainability and corporate social responsibility assurances. In light of recent developments in capital markets and corporate governance practices, other priority areas have come to the fore, including digitalization to improve the supervision and implementation of corporate governance principles, strengthening the engagement by institutional investors with investee companies, and issuing Stewardship Codes (G20/OECD, 2022).

A growing body of academic literature (Casu et al., 2023; Chaly et al., 2017) emphasizes the crucial role of organizational culture in shaping behavior and influencing misconduct risks. A stronger culture within organizations has been associated with enhanced resilience, improved employee morale and well-being, and greater long-term productivity. Additionally, there is increasing evidence highlighting the significance of diversity and inclusion in fostering a strong and positive organizational culture. International governance codes and initiatives (the United Nations 2015 Sustainable Development Goals; the 2013 OECD Recommendation of the Council on Gender Equality in Education, Employment and Entrepreneurship) recognise the value of diverse experiences and perspectives in decision-making processes as they can foster social progress and sustainable development worldwide.

More theoretical and empirical research is needed in these areas. This Special Issue of the Review of Corporate Finance invites submissions of high-quality articles relevant to emerging topics in international corporate governance, including (but not limited to):

- Board quality, effectiveness, and composition

- Corporate culture

- Global firms and corporate social responsibility

- Diversity and inclusion

- Executive compensation

- International corporate governance standards and practices

- Risk management frameworks

- Stakeholders-oriented decision-making

- Sustainability and ESG factors

- Transparency and reporting

- Trust, ethical conduct, and integrity

- Digitalisation and corporate governance

Paper Submission Procedure:

Interested authors should submit their paper by email to efic@essex.ac.uk with “RCF Special Issue Submission” in the subject. The submission deadline is January 15, 2024.

About the Review of Corporate Finance (RCF):

RCF is published by Now Publishers. Now publishes papers as Green OA: articles are published under the terms of a non-commercial Creative Commons license (CC-BY-NC), which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. These terms mean that you own the copyright to your own work, and transfer a license to Now to print the paper in the journal. You can use the work in subsequent material (e.g., develop or reprint it in a book) as long as you cite the original work. It allows you to maintain your work in open access, which is consistent with most granting body requirements.

RCF prints papers in hard and soft copies. The issues are online here: https://www.nowpublishers.com/RCF

Forthcoming papers are online here: https://sites.google.com/view/review-of-corporate-finance/forthcoming-papers?authuser=0

Contributors to RCF so far include top scholars such as Renee Adams, Franklin Allen, Ronald Anderson, Allen Berger, Tom Chemmanur, Tim Jenkinson, David Reeb, among others. Over two dozen RCF authors have over 5,000 citations.

RCF considers original empirical and theoretical papers, as well as methodological contributions, survey papers, and shorter commentaries. All topics in corporate finance are welcome, including interdisciplinary topics. In addition to the official page at Now Publishers, the editors maintain a personal journal page https://sites.google.com/view/review-of-corporate-finance/home?authuser=0 which has details on the scope of the journal, editors and associate editors, and associated conferences.

Google Scholar Cites / Doc for RCF paper as at Oct 1, 2023 for papers published 2021-2024: 11.57 (=752/65)

https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=shXUEEEAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&authuser=3

References

Casu, B., Gallo, A., Kalotychou, E., Sarkisyan, A. (2023) Bank Misconduct, Board Diversity and CEO Turnover, Review of Corporate Finance 3, 149-174.

Chaly, S., Hennessy, J., Menand., L., Stiroh., K., Tracy, J. (2017) Misconduct Risk, Culture, and Supervision, Federal Reserve Bank of New York White Paper.

Fields, R., O’Kelley, R. (2023) Global Corporate Governance Trends for 2023, Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance.

G20/OECD (2022) Public Consultation on Draft Revisions to the G20/OECD Principles of Corporate Governance, 19 September – 21 October.