Developing Corporate Governance Research through Qualitative Methods: A Review of Previous Studies

• Author: Alessandro Zattoni,Terry McNulty,Thomas Douglas
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/corg.12006
• Date: 01 March 2013
• Published date: 01 March 2013

Developing Corporate Governance Research

through Qualitative Methods: A Review of

Previous Studies

Terry McNulty, Alessandro Zattoni*, and Thomas Douglas

ABSTRACT

Manuscript Type: Review

Research Question/Issue: The article is concerned with the prevalence, character, and development of qualitative research

within the f‌ield of corporate governance. The paper provides an overview of published qualitative research in the f‌ield of

corporate governance based on a structured literature search of papers published in scholarly peer-reviewed journals

between 1986 and 2011.

Research Findings/Insights: A f‌ine-grained search based on key words resulted in a sample of 78 qualitative corporate

governance studies. A review and content analysis of these studies show that qualitative studies in governance have grown

in number since the 1990s, but remain a small fraction of the published work on corporate governance. Studies are mostly

developed by UK and European scholars, published in European journals and tend to explore boards of directors more than

other governance related actors and mechanisms. These studies utilize a range of disciplines, predominantly management,

adopting a wide range of methods, the most prevalent being that of the interview, often in combination with other methods

to get a better account of the empirical phenomenon.

Theoretical/Academic Implications: The search reveals an eclectic range of theories, spanning several disciplines, which is

serving to generate, elaborate, and ref‌ine theorizing about corporate governance and the associated meanings, mechanisms,

processes and relationships. There is much scope and need for more qualitative studies of signif‌icant rigor and relevance

which explore the array of interactions and processes involved in corporate governance, across different levels of analysis

and contexts.

Practitioner/Policy Implications: After over two decades of research and reform of corporate governance, problems of

practice remain, and corporate governance prescription via codes and other forms of regulation is increasing in search of

better governance. Qualitative research can assist policy-makers and practitioners to develop more eff‌icient governance

mechanisms, by shedding light on the eff‌icacy of policy prescription. Qualitative research provides a basis for rethinking

and challenging some of the dominant assumptions and meanings about how governance actors and institutions actually

function.

Keywords: Corporate Governance, Qualitative Research, Theory, Method

INTRODUCTION

This article reviews qualitative research in corporate

governance in order to both characterize the body of

work on corporate governance using qualitative methods in

terms of research topics, questions, settings, and methods

and to suggest some ways forward for advancing under-

standing of corporate governance through qualitative

research. This paper is positioned as a contribution to sit

alongside other recent reviews of the state of knowledge in

corporate governance such as: Durisin and Puzone’s (2009)

meta analysis of corporate governance research between

1993 and 2007; Pugliese, Bezemer, Zattoni, Huse, Van den

Bosch, and Volberda’s (2009) review of the literature about

board of directors contribution to strategy; Ahrens, Fila-

totchev, and Thomsen’s (2011) discussion of research fron-

tiers in corporate governance;Deutsch’s (2005) review of the

impact of board composition on f‌irms’ critical decisions;

Boyd, Haynes,and Zona’s (2011) review of CEO–Board rela-

tions; and Ryan, Bechholtz, and Kolb’s (2010) review of

research at the intersection of business ethics and corporate

governance.

*Address for correspondence: AlessandroZattoni, Strategic Management Department,

SDA Bocconi School of Management, Viale Isonzo 23, 20135 Milano, Italy. Tel:

39 0258362527; Fax:39 0258362530; E-mail: alessandro.zattoni@unibocconi.it

183

Corporate Governance: An International Review, 2013, 21(2): 183–198

© 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

doi:10.1111/corg.12006

This paper is unique as none of these reviews privilege

attention to qualitative research per se, though they do

suggest a need for the sort of knowledge that is developed

through qualitative research inquiry.Ahrens et al. (2011) call

for f‌ield studies of corporate governance practice that

address interactions and key relationships between various

corporate governancepractitioners. Opening a recent special

issue of Organization Science, Hambrick, von Werder, and

Zajac (2008: 381) also suggest a f‌ield in “. . . f‌lux; as corpo-

rations and societal norms evolve”. Some of the research

questions f‌lagged for attention include attending to formal

and informal structures and processes, including power,

which affect boardrooms and the roles of key institutional

actors who inf‌luence governance practices at societal level.

Shareholder heterogeneity and stakeholder diversity are

also viewed as requiring greater attention in future gover-

nance research. Aspirations for greater attention to context,

process, structure (formal and informal), director motives

and identities, behavioral dynamics and (power) relations

suggest a f‌ield of corporate governance in need of research

that pursues theoretical and empirical development through

direct engagement with the actors and settings involved in

governance phenomena (e.g., Huse, Hoskisson, Zattoni, &

Viganò, 2011; Pugliese et al., 2009).

Direct, f‌irst-hand engagement is one of the distinguishing

features of qualitative research (Birkinshaw, Brannan, &

Tung, 2011), and so against this backdrop we have sought to

complement existing knowledge of the f‌ield through a

focused review of published qualitative studies on corporate

governance that appeared in scholarly journals between

1986 and 2011. We searchedthrough databases using several

keywords and eventuallyidentif‌ied 78 qualitative articles on

governance topics. Then we analyzed all articles using a set

of criteria aimed at exploring their characteristics in terms of

date and outlet of publication, nationality and number of

authors, theoretical frameworks, and empirical settings. The

results show that qualitative studies on governance (1) have

grown in number since the 1990s but remain a small fraction

of the published work on corporate governance; (2) are

mostly developed by UK scholars and published in Euro-

pean journals; (3) draw on a range of disciplines, predomi-

nantly management; and (4) adopt a wide range of methods,

the most prevalent being the interview, often in combination

with other methods to get a better account of the empirical

phenomenon.

Our results have implications for both research and

practice. Recent special issues on corporate governance

raised a call to go beyond simple input and output models

based on simplistic agency assumptions (e.g., Daily, Dalton,

& Cannella, 2003; Hambrick, von Werder, & Zajac, 2008;

Huse et al., 2011). Ahrens et al. (2011) suggest that the f‌inan-

cial crisis has exposed the lack of value and insight of much

published work in corporate governance. Certainly, it has

conf‌irmed corporate governanceto be a topic of major social,

economic, and political signif‌icance on a global scale. In its

connection to law, regulation, and policy reform, it ranges

across macro-national and pan-national institutions. Yet at

the same time, it also touches on the micro processes by

which we understand actors and groups at f‌irm and sub-

f‌irm level. As an evolving, complex, global, multi-level phe-

nomenon, it is ripe for and is requiring of inquiry that can

explore, describe, and compare governance phenomena

with due sensitivity to the diversity and context in which

they are embedded. In line with these calls and using this

survey as a platform, theoretically, we aspire to greater use

of qualitative methods that explore processes and interac-

tions in a real empirical context, and follow a more eclectic

range of theoretical frameworks. Practically, the f‌inancial

crisis is a salutary reminder of the need to move forward

with respect to the questions asked, phenomenon studied,

theories employed, and prescriptions providedby corporate

research.

Following this introduction the next section further dis-

cusses the character of qualitative research and proceeds to

map existing qualitative research in corporate governance

using a wide range of criteria. Through these criteria we

offer, to our knowledge, the f‌irst descriptive and analytical

overview of qualitative research in corporate governance.

Thereafter, the paper moves to a discussion of evaluating

quality in qualitative research drawing on the twin tenets

of theoretical contribution and methodological rigor. The

sample of studies identif‌ied by this review is considered

in these terms, leading to some suggestions for corporate

governance research to develop further using qualitative

inquiry.

CHARACTERIZING QUALITATIVE

RESEARCH IN CORPORATE GOVERNANCE

Selection of Journals and Papers

We approached the review by considering qualitative

research inquiry to be a diverse activity that embraces a

variety of assumptions and practices but is in essence a

“situated activity” that occurs in the locale(s) of phenomena

and attends to the interpretations of actors, relationships,

and events in their natural settings (Denzin & Lincoln,2005).

Def‌ining characteristics of qualitative research include: (1)

data collection in the natural “f‌ield” setting; (2) researcher as

key to data collection; (3) multiple sources of data; (4) induc-

tive data analysis, a focus on meanings of participants; (5)

emergent research design; (6) interpretive inquiry; and (7)

holistic account and use of a theoretical lens (Cresswell,

2007).

To identify previous qualitative studies focused on

corporate governance, we explored peer-reviewed studies

published in a range of general management and themed

journals, regardless of their impact factor (Seglen, 1994). We

were particularly guided in our search by two recent

reviews, both published in Corporate Governance: An Interna-

tional Review (CGIR): Durisin and Puzone’s (2009) meta-

analysis of corporate governance research between 1993 and

2007, and Pugliese et al.’s (2009) review of the literature

about board of directors’ contribution to strategy, as well as

the recent review of qualitative research in management

(Bluhm, Harman, Lee, & Mitchell, 2011). We selected all

journals included in these previous reviews plus additional

others that we knew had published qualitative research in

corporate governance. Our search produced over 1,200

articles containing the phrase “corporate governance” (see

Table 1 for a journal’s distribution). In the next phase, we

used the databases ABI/Inform,Business Source Premier,

184 CORPORATE GOVERNANCE

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