This thesis investigates the overall acceptance of the Code of Corporate Governance for Bangladesh by examining the level of acceptance and the factors influencing compliance. The study identifies the code provisions which are most and least complied with and examines the perceptions of different stakeholder groups relating to the barriers of good governance, the causes of non-compliance with the Code and the appropriate model of governance for Bangladesh. The study uses a questionnaire survey for the listed companies in Bangladesh and the semi-structured interview method with the stakeholder groups. The shareholder and the stakeholder theoretical perspectives are adopted to interpret the results. The findings suggest that the level of compliance amongst the sample companies is at a moderate level. However, the findings also indicate that the sample companies are following the regulatory provisions, and the Code is yet to be widely accepted by the companies. The corporate infrastructure of Bangladesh appears to be dysfunctional in most, if not all, aspects. Hence, the polarization of the shareholder and stakeholder perspectives is to some extent unrealistic in the case of Bangladesh; rather an appropriate model of governance is considered to be the one that prioritizes the needs and ability of the country.

This thesis is a single case study on Chinese accounting, the research question it attempts to answer is the possible application of international accounting standards in China. In order to answer the research question, it first studies the differences of contexts between international accounting and Chinese accounting, subsequently, from the perspective of conceptual framework, elucidates the dissimilarities between Chinese accounting and international accounting and the causes which bring about these differences. The final conclusion is that China has not yet possessed the necessary conditions for the application of international accounting standards.

Accountants have distinct status, niches and markets from other occupational groups. Moreover, they are professionalized differently in different contexts. Many former British colonies, for instance Nigeria, Australia and India, have adopted the British model of accountancy profession as it is shown in the extant accounting literature. However, little is known about the accounting profession in Cyprus; an island that was once a British colony and later became European Union (hereafter, EU) member. This thesis sets out to examine the emergence and development of the accountancy profession in Cyprus and the establishment of the local professional accountancy body, namely ICPAC. Using the lens of critical realism and supplementing it with the notions of capitalism, colonialism, imperialism and globalization, this research explores the societal relationships, interactions and structural factors that have influenced the local accounting profession and the establishment of ICPAC. The data of the study are derived oral history interviews and an analysis of archival sources. The study demonstrates that the accounting profession in Cyprus has emerged and developed with the help of the existing structures produced and reproduced throughout the years under the influence of local (e.g. the State, ministers, MPs, non-qualified accountants) and global (e.g. the EU, ‘Big Four’ firms, British professional bodies) forces. The evidence presented in the thesis illustrates how a small island with an emerging economy has been forced to change strategies, choices and plans based on colonial, local and later global influences. This transformation has had a profound impact on the emergence of the local accounting profession and on constructing the island’s identity. Cypriots continue to emulate the British accounting model, British professional bodies, their services and products. This thesis argues that the British legacies in the form of social structures have remained strong and uninfluenced throughout time. Cyprus still seems to be under British colonialism, perhaps in its new form, neocolonialism, in terms of the development and functioning of the accounting profession.

This thesis explores the changing nature of accountancy in Birmingham and the increasing price-sensitivity of the industry, which is producing interesting tensions inside firms and between the workplace and home lives. This is part of ongoing commoditization, which has been frequently cited in the literature, but overlooked empirically. This research presents an integrated analysis of commoditization based upon 60 semi-structured interviews, investigating its drivers as well as the responses to the phenomenon. A conceptualisation of the current phase of commoditization is presented and the adaptations in firm level routines are explored. It then analyses the impacts of commoditization and changing firm practices on the lives of individuals at work, and the resultant effect on home lives. This thesis uncovers an increasing hybridisation of the worlds of work and home and highlights the contested nature of the boundary between the two spaces, which is placing constraints on career lifestyles. This work contributes a holistic and empirical understanding of commoditization to the literature, changing the way that knowledge services are conceptualised. It also uncovers new dimensions of organisational routines; hidden and visible routines, and identifies the individual as a powerful actor in the performance of firm routines, contributing to the literature on evolutionary theory.

Theoretical attempts in Social and Environmental Accounting (SEA) research have not paid sufficient attention to the internal processes and assemblages of producing SEA. This study closely examines the networks of human actors and non-human actants that, in the case of a Sri Lankan bank (anonymised as ABC Bank), produced the Social and Environmental Accounts. The first question this research addresses, therefore, is ‘what is the composition of the actor-network that produces the social and environmental accounts, and how was it assembled and reassembled’? The research adopts an Actor-network theory (ANT) approach. ANT is not only a theory, it is also a research approach, which guides the researcher in the collection of data. This opens up the second research question, which is: ‘what do we learn and how is our understanding of SEA changed through an application of an ANT approach to the study of the production of social and environmental accounts in a particular case’. ANT is often accused of being an essentially uncritical organisational theory, an approach that lacks the capacity to carry substantive political critique. This unresolved debate leads to the third research question that this thesis sets out to answer: ‘can the application of ANT as a research approach, in the study of a particular case of SEA reporting, be critical and if so how’? In this research, the data collection has been carried out through the study of the production of the social and environmental accounts of the case company in two consecutive years. ANT as a theory provides methodological guidance that exhorts the researcher “to follow the actors”, and to attend to the relations between actors and the performativity of the network. Following this guidance carefully, it takes us close to the actors and reveals the contingency of the production of the social and environmental accounts on the mobilisation of actors and their interests. This research demonstrates that SEA reporting is shaped by the contingencies of the network behind the production of the accounts, including the relations between the ambitions and vanities of individuals and the interests and features of things including reporting award schemes and standards. This leads to identifying two different actor-network building processes and different outcomes in the two years studied. The findings of this research lead us to critically question the putative functions of SEA and leads us to question whether they respond to norms of accountability. This study challenges the normative objectives of SEA found in the prior literature. While ANT does allow us to develop, in detail, a view of how things are and how they come to be through the mobilisation of power and translation of interests. Such understanding provides a basis for a critical challenge to the way things are. The study demonstrates the critical use of ANT approach and shows that ANT is not only a “valuable framework for the empirical analysis of the organising process” (Whittle and Spicer, 2008, p. 611) but also able to provide a critical account of the organisation.

This study examines the governance and accountability practices and reforms in UK building societies following the 2008 financial crisis. Theoretically, this study explores the notion of mutual accountability and governance systems in delineating the (re)structuring of UK building societies’ governance and accountability practices, in response to the crisis. Data for the study are derived from thirty-eight in-depth interviews with key stakeholders in building societies, including executives, non-executives, ex-directors, an auditor, a regulator and customers, as well as publicly available documents and non-participant observation of a number of members’ meetings. The findings of the study demonstrate that the industry’s internal, intermediate and external governance structures have significantly altered in the post-crisis era with a positive impact on the mutual accountability. Coercive pressure from regulators has led to improvements on building societies’ internal governance structures, including but not limited to board composition, internal control and risk management frameworks. Intermediate governance structure, unique to mutual organisations, is embedded within UK building societies as the fundamental mechanism in achieving democracy and mutual accountability. However, the political and economic uncertainty and regulatory reforms in the financial services sector have continued to pose challenges in the governance and long-term performance of regional building societies. Intensifying regulations have increased the costs and workload for building societies and led many of these societies to emphasize the “form” rather than true “substance” of good governance practices. There is the need for regulators and policy makers to realise the difference among building societies and to develop appropriate codes of governance and regulations which are not one-size-fits-all.

This thesis consists of three empirical papers that investigate the impacts of equity incentives on accounting fraud from the perspective of the risk it presents for CEOs and controlling shareholders. As a prerequisite for this thesis, the first paper investigates whether AAERs constitute a reliable accounting fraud database, despite their partial coverage of misreporting cases and the resource constraints of the SEC. Using comprehensive samples covering three financial misreporting databases from the U.S., I find that, compared to securities class action lawsuits and restatements, AAERs are composed of firms that are more likely to represent material accounting irregularities, which are characterised by aggressive adoption of accruals, strong financing needs, and significant market impact of misreporting cases. The second paper investigates whether CEOs change their misreporting behaviours at higher levels of equity incentives, at which they may begin to seriously consider the risk side of incentives. Using both unmatched and matched accounting fraud samples from the U.S., I find that, contrary to misreporting patterns at average equity incentives, CEOs’ option delta is negatively associated with accounting fraud propensity, whereas their stock ownership is positively related to this at respectively higher levels. The third paper examines the extent to which, in the context of accounting fraud, controlling shareholders’ control-ownership wedge interacts with their ownership concentration - a common feature of business groups - and with the additional imposition of government regulation on Korean chaebols. Using matched samples from Korea, I find that control-ownership wedge is positively associated with accounting fraud propensity, whereas business group and chaebol affiliations are not. Overall, the results suggest that the impacts of equity incentives on accounting fraud propensity hinge critically on how CEOs and controlling shareholders perceive the risk of accounting fraud commitment.

Shareholder surveys consistently demonstrate users' perceptions of the importance of annual report disclosures in the decision-making process and their readership of the Chairman's narrative. - Yet existing empirical evidence casts doubt on the informational content of any part of the annual report. This study offers a partial explanation of this anomaly by demonstrating the decision usefulness of annual report disclosures, focusing on improvements made possible by a more detailed analysis of the content and its presentation. The Chairman's narrative provides a voluntary disclosure acting as a vehicle for signalling the intentions of the executive, but also as an opportunity to convey information incremental to the financial statements. The absence of a shared meaning for accounting terms between the users and preparers of the, accounts provides a further opportunity for miscommunication. and misinformation. Such differences may be attributable to either the complexity of content or the complexity of presentation. Both are addressed in this study. With regard to content, the study examines the environmental predictability of the semantic content by constructing explanatory models of the financial performance of the enterprise. With regard to presentation, both the readability and cognisability of the narrative are evaluated with reference to the size and financial performance of the enterprise. The study concludes with an examination of alternative methods for the presentation of financial information, focusing on the use of schematic faces as a potentially unique format with specific portrayal advantages. The facial format is shown to be an efficient method of processing, producing decisions of comparable quality to those with financial statement information, and in a much shorter time. An approach is adopted which rectifies the deficiencies of earlier studies by incorporating the full force of the existing psychological evidence and by generating an optimum feature assignment experimentally.

The present study is an empirically based analysis of liquidity management. The study contributes to the understanding of how U.K.-based companies handle the problem of unexpected events which have major negative implications for the expected funds flow equilibrium of the firm. In particular, the study was aimed at discovering the kind of liquidity management being implemented in practice, and the relationship between specific liquidity management practices and certain characteristics of the firm, and of its (headquarters) finance department. Evidence of the subject in the U.K. is very thin. It is therefore important to collect information on the state of the art in the practice of liquidity management in the U.K. particularly since, for the last decade, companies have been so negatively affected by the instability and unpredictability of the business environment. The study also contributes to the identification of differences between theory and practice. In this respect, it is expected that the recognition of actual differences will challenge not only the level at which companies practice liquidity management but also the teaching of the subject in current corporate finance courses.

This research reports on an investigation into the utility of published accounting information to the most sophisticated user the investor. The approach adopted is to paramorphically represent the investor's decision making process by seeking to establish a set of causal relationships between accounting number based inputs to this process, and the outputs, viz relative share prices. Unlike previous studies in this area, this research explicitly recognises the configural nature of human information processing activity. Application of an appropriate methodology to uncover and explore these configural relationships, Automatic Interaction Detector (AID), offers original insights into the share price fixing mechanism. More specifically the results obtained provide evidence on: 1) the degree of association between published accounting data and share prices and thus a measure of the value of accounting information to investors, 2) the complexity of the investor's decision making process and 3) the validity of certain established theories in finance. Whilst analysis highlights the strong relationship between historic accounting information and relative share values the evidence presented is consistent with the thesis that only a limited set of measureable accounts-based variables may be used in the assessment process, viz earnings, dividends, short-term liquidity and marketability. Moreover, the complex set of interactions identified between these variables confirms a priori expectations on the configural nature of the investor's decision making process. A close examination of these interactions reveals that although earnings and dividends may dominate relative share values, the extent of their influence varies with the underlying quality of earnings. These findings have implications for the theory of share valuation, the dividends versus earnings controversy and the role of investment risk in the U.K. stock market. Empirical evidence relating to to the capital structure debate is also provided. Other areas of investigation encompass an examination of the most appropriate measures of relative share valuation for this type of research, a comparison of the merits of linear additive and configural analytical techniques, and the dimensionality and normality of financial ratios. The operational utility of the 'decision-usefulness' criterion in the evaluation of accounting numbers and the use of pragmatic empiricism in the application of this criterion are also critically appraised.