One of the most controversial issues in corporate governance is whether the CEO of a corporation should also serve as chairman of the board. In theory, an independent board chair improves the ability of the board to oversee management. However, an independent chairman is not unambiguously...

Shareholders pay considerable attention to the choice of executive selected as the new CEO whenever a change in leadership takes place. However, without an inside look at the leading candidates to assume the CEO role, it is difficult for shareholders to tell whether the board has made the...

New Zealand has the reputation as a pioneering nation in policy reform- it was the first to introduce a comprehensive no fault based system for accident compensation, it had an early form of the welfare state, it embraced the economic reforms of the 1980s, and it was the first country to allow...

Research Question/Issue: We investigate whether female directors influence the social performance of Microfinance Institutions (MFIs). We also explore the factors that might condition or moderate the influence of female directors on the different dimensions of MFIs’ social performance.Research...

Previous research on women directors mostly explores the link between women directors and firm performance. The potential mediators explaining this link are largely under-researched. In our exploratory paper, we investigate women directors' roles in interviews with female and male board members....

In the last 20 years many countries have introduced ad hoc regulations to increase gender diversity in boardrooms. The empirical evidences about the consequences of such regulations on firm performance are mixed. In this paper I investigate the impact of mandatory gender quotas policies on the...

The participation of women in top-level corporate boards (or rather the lack of it) is subject to intense public debate. Several countries are considering legally binding quotas to increase the share of women on boards. Indeed, research on board diversity suggests positive effects of gender...

The participation of women in top-level corporate boards (or rather the lack of it) is subject to intense public debate. Several countries are considering legally binding quotas to increase the share of women on boards. Indeed, research on board diversity suggests positive effects of gender...

Using a large sample of Chinese firms, we examine performance differences between firms with female and male chairs and the channels through which such differences arise. After controlling for the presence of female CEOs and non-chair female directors, we find that chairwoman firms perform...