دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی فراتر از مرزهای معمول: حاکمیت شرکتی برای تحقیقات حسابداری انتقادی - الزویر 2017

ABSTRACT

Drawing on my research (with colleagues) in the corporate governance area, I reflect on the development of intellectual trajectories within the critical accounting research project. Recognizing that the boundaries surrounding critical research are quite hazy and fluctuating, the role of epistemological guidance, methodological flexibility, chance encounters and theoretical bricolage in the production of critical accounting inquiries is underlined. Importantly, the studies that I review demonstrate that corporate governance settings constitute privileged sites to investigate power and marginalization processes. Focused on the backstage of corporate governance, these studies bring to the fore two key processes through which power and marginalization operate at the board level. The first relates to the constitution and propagation of myths. The second consists of board members whose reflective skills are kept underdeveloped. From a forward looking perspective, I especially seek to encourage the future development of critical research on corporate governance in ways that break the mold of gap-spotting research. In particular, I maintain that critical academics may benefit significantly, when elaborating their research endeavors, from considering further two central questions: corporate governance for whom; and corporate governance for what?

3. Forward looking perspective

In highlighting angles that I view as promising for further critical research in corporate governance, readers should keep in mind the constraining and blinkering effects that may ensue from gap-spotting behavior (Alvesson & Sandberg, 2013). Following the previous literature too closely may restrain one’s imaginative capabilities; this inclination is particularly problematic in the context of the critical accounting research project – given that one of its epistemological purposes is to challenge the order of things.

We saw in the previous section that corporate governance settings constitute important sites in the study of how marginalization operates (e.g., marginalization of regulatory change initiatives, marginalization of criticisms conveyed in the public arena regarding excessive CEO remuneration, marginalization of endeavors to reflect on the substance of risk management, and so on). Boards are commonly involved in approving or making corporate decisions with consequences on communities, ways of thinking, types of expertise and interests. In particular, the research I reviewed above on the backstage of corporate governance brings to the fore at least two key processes through which power and marginalization operate at the board level. The first relates to the constitution and propagation of myths. The second consists of board members whose reflective skills are kept underdeveloped. The important point is that much remains to be done to better understand such processes.