This thesis aims to evaluate the competitive situation in the Swedish banking sector. The banking sector in Sweden is characterized by its high degree of concentration, with four major banks controlling a large share of the market. Combined with high profits and high interest margins, this has raised concerns regarding the competitive pressures in the sector. Many existing theories in the literature try to evaluate competition based on market structure, however modern research concludes that high concentration does not necessarily imply less competition. By using a model that estimates the elasticity of factor input prices, the competitive behavior among the market players can be assessed and the results reveal a less competitive situation on the Swedish market compared to previous research within the field of banking competition.

Companies have been providing information on their interactions with the environment since the 1880s however there has been an upsurge in the amount of information they provide over the last three decades. This has been driven by a variety of legislative, internal, social drivers. These corporate environmental disclosures appear within three key channels and media: via the Internet, in their AnnuaVFinancial Report and in a stand alone Environmental Report. The USA was the fIrst country to introduce statutory requirements relating to the disclosure of environmental information in the AnnuaVFinancial Report - Securities Release 5235 and 5386. Many other countries, including the UK, are now considering making environmental disclosure, in some shape or form, mandatory. Benchmarking studies are frequently applied identify the leading companies in terms of Environmental Reports; companies within the utility sector are repeatedly cited as leaders. However most research and benchmarking studies compare what themes have been disclosed in a single channel or media, for example, emissions, waste, energy, and do not examine the quality of the disclosures or compare those disclosures in the different channels and media. Recently, qualitative characteristics relating to the quality of environmental disclosures have been developed including, inter alia, accessibility, credibility and inclusivity. This thesis therefore aims to (1) assess whether utility companies are also leaders in environmental disclosure via the Internet and in their AnnuaVFinancial Reports, (2) compare the effects of a voluntary and mandatory disclosure requirements on the environmental themes and qualitative characteristics disclosed in the AnnuaVFinancial Reports and Environmental Reports of electric power utilities based in the UK and USA and applies Lasswell's model as an integrating framework for (1) and (2) in order to assess what, if any, inferences can be made from a direct content analysis relating to 'why' and 'with what effect' environmental disclosures are made. Content analysis is applied to meet the three main aims of this thesis. First, a basic appearance or nonappearance form of content analysis is applied on 275 (utility and non-utility) companies to assess whether utility companies are also leaders in environmental disclosure via the Internet. The amount location and type of environmental themes that were disclosed within the AnnuaVFinancial Reports of 100 (utility and non-utility) companies were then identifIed via content analysis to assess whether utility companies are also leaders in environmental disclosure in their Annual Report and Financial Report. A more complex frequency content analysis was applied to assess the environmental themes and the qualitative characteristics disclosed by 20 electric power companies based in the UK and USA in their AnnuaVFinancial Reports and Environmental Reports to evaluate the affect of voluntary and mandatory disclosure requirements. The research shows that no companies are fully exploiting the capabilities of the Internet for environmental disclosure and that no one sector stands out as a leader. The oil, gas, coal and related services sector, not the utility sector, are leaders in terms of environmental disclosure within the AnnuaVFinancial Report, indeed there does not appear to be any consensus within the utility sector regarding the environmental themes that should be disclosed. Mandatory disclosure requirements heavily influence the amount, themes, balance, character and specifIcity of environmental disclosures made by of electric power companies based in the USA who appeared to target their disclosures in the AnnuaVFinancial Report and Environmental Report at different audiences. Electric power companies based in the UK, where there are no mandatory disclosure requirements, disclosed double the amount of information in their Environmental Report than companies based in the USA but disclosed less information in their AnnuaVFinancial Report which was virtually a subset of those in their Environmental Report in terms of the amount, themes, balance, character and specifIcity. It can be concluded from the application of Lasswell's model that environmental disclosures are made due to a combination of drivers, the types and qualitative characteristics of those disclosures depend on the relative importance of those drivers. More importantly the environmental disclosures have little effect due to their lack of credibility, and environmental disclosures, in particular, via the Internet were found to be unduly burdensome in terms of their accessibility. Stakeholders will fmd it difficult to create an informed image until there are generally accepted or mandatory standardised data collection methods, measurements and presentation for collating the environmental information itself and for the verifIcation statement therefore they need to be aware of the limitations of corporate environmental disclosures, be critical of the information and go back to the company for more details on any area of specific interest. Although companies may not want to allow stakeholders to create an informed image, guidelines are presented that can be used by companies to improve the accessibility and credibility of their environmental disclosures.

Constant media exposure of organisational wrong-doing; unethical dealings and illegal practices have come to dominate the discussions on corporate governance. Such exposures are normally brought about by, among others, stake-holder activism and organisational employees. Usually, in such cases, employees have had prior knowledge about the organisational misdeeds, but chose not to, or were afraid to speak out. If they did speak out, then organisational retaliation would befall the individual whistleblower without any attention to the issues raised; which tends to bring the organisational integrity into question. Numerous case studies and research initiatives have demonstrated that whistle-blowing can and does play a positive role in strengthening accountability mechanisms in organisations, and, by extension, helps build organisational integrity (Jos, 1991:105-118; Johnson & Kraft, 1990:849-874). The aim of this article is to explore theoretically the nature of whistleblowing as it transcends across legal, ethical/moral and social fields. This will be demonstrated using documented South African cases of organisational misfortunes. This exploration will be used to highlight aspects to be considered for a framework in building whistleblower infrastructure as an integral component of the organisational integrity, both in public and private organisations.

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The emergence of new public management has been implicated in the changes that have occurred in the public sectors of western democracies. One outcome of these changes is that the public sector is expected to operate in a more commercial manner and that it be accountable not only for the money that it spends but also for the effectiveness with which it spends those funds. In response to these expectations, changes have occurred in both the accounting technologies and reporting mechanisms for the public sector. The Treasuries and Departments of Finance for each jurisdiction in Australia set accounting and financial reporting policy for the public sector. However, since the establishment of the Public Sector Accounting Standards Board in 1983, the commonwealth and state governments have shown a willingness to adopt standards issued by the accounting profession. The adoption of three specific public sector accounting standards developed by the accounting profession in accordance with the conceptual framework, mean that a financial reporting model, based on the private sector 'decision-useful model', has been adopted in the Australian public sector. The 'decision-useful model' incorporates dependent users who are reliant on general purpose financial reports to make economic decisions. The decision to adopt this model for all public sector reporting entities, did not receive unanimous support. The complexities of the public sector formed the foundation for critics to question the applicability of this model to the public sector. In addition, critics argued that the model lacked empirical substantiation. The purpose of this research is to determine the applicability of the 'decision-useful model' to the public sector by empirically identifying users of public sector general purpose financial reports and their information requirements. Prior empirical research has been piecemeal in terms of both scope and research method. As a result, it has not been cumulative. This research will refine and extend the work of previous studies in two ways. First, in terms of scope, it will encompass all public sector entity types and will address all three elements of the 'decision-useful model' - the identity of users, what information they use and their purposes for requiring information. Second, this research will adopt a method which directly accesses users across public sector entity types. As a consequence, an assessment is able to be made of the applicability of the 'decision-useful model' in general and its application to specific public sector entity types. The findings of this research indicate that the 'decision-useful model' is misspecified in the public sector and that there are significant differences among public sector entity types in terms of users and their information requirements. First, the classification of users as normatively determined is not exhaustive and includes a large representation of non-dependant users. Second, all users preferred performance information and narrative information was preferred over general purpose financial reports. Further, users considered that general purpose financial information was more useful for accountability purposes than for decision making. These results should be useful to policymakers and accounting standard setters in the future prescription of the contents of financial reports for public sector entities.

Diss. Stockholm : Stockholms universitet, 2005.