7. Conclusion
China’s economic reform and corporatisation have taken a unique approach and resulted in a unique corporate governance system. Like in other countries, the development of China’s corporate governance is shaped to varying degrees by the institutional characteristics of the political and economic systems, social ethos and theoretical ideas. However, as a transitional economy that was converted from a different regime, China inevitably turned to the west and borrowed many of the ideas and practices of different corporate governance models that have worked well in the established markets (e.g., the Anglo-American model and the German model). As a result, China’s corporate governance represents a mosaic of borrowed and modified governance mechanisms which may not always be compatible with its unique social, historical, political and economic context.
This study reveals the important role the Chinese government plays in corporate governance of the listed firms. The government has tight control over the firms through its controlling interest in the firms, which, to some extent, reduces the likelihood of the company management committing corporate fraud. However, this does not mean China’s corporate governance is a good one and is effective. As shown in prior research (e.g., Xu and Wang, 1999; Chen, 2001), the state shareholding has contributed to the poor performance of Chinese listed firms as there is little incentive for management to maximise the value of the firm. The state controlling interest has shielded firms from market scrutiny and discipline, which is detrimental to the further development of the corporate sector in China.
As an exploratory attempt, this study inevitably has a number of limitations, which provide scope for future research in this area. Firstly, the study only investigated the management-perpetrated financial statement fraud. Other kinds of fraud are not included in this study, which could be more significant concerns given the unique features (i.e., Chinese characteristics) of the business environment and institutional setting in the country. Secondly, only fraud firms that received penalties from the CSRC in the time period covered by this study were examined. Since the reporting of the CSCR penalties on fraud firms could be delayed for longer period of time, this study might have missed some other fraud firms. Thirdly, the results should not be extended to non-listed firms as their governance structures and the role played by the government in these firms could altogether be different.
A logical extension to this study would be expanding testing variables. In China, the corporate governance structure is still developing and improving. A number of corporate governance variables (such as, independent directors, auditor quality) that were not present when the current study was conducted are now available. Inclusion of the new variables for investigation would likely improve the model accuracy.
Table 1 Selection of 39 Fraud Firms All fraud firms that had been reported by mid 2003 by CSRC in its News Release to have committed fraud in the time period under investigation 92
Eliminated because annual report could not be retrieved (23)
Eliminated because the fraud was not reported in annual report* (10)
Eliminated because the fraud had no financial effect* (30)
Final sample size of fraud firms 39
* These two types of fraud are either not management-perpetrated fraud or no financial effect and thus are excluded from the investigation.
TABLE 3
Logit Regression Results from Test of Hypotheses for a Sample of
39 Fraud Firms Matched with 39 No-Fraud Firms
FRAUDi = α+β1%State +β2%Legal +β3%BoDshare +β4%NoComD
+β5DUAL + β6%NoComS +β7DEBT +β8%ComPro + εi Variables Hypotheses Predicted 公司治理与企业舞弊英文文献和翻译(15):http://www.751com.cn/fanyi/lunwen_245.html