Offshore paragons or pariahs: the unique corporate governance influences of small emerging offshore economies
Offshore paragons or pariahs: the unique corporate governance influences of small emerging offshore economies
This study investigates how elite non-executive directors shape firms’adoption of Anglo-American corporate governance in offshore and emerging economies. By integrating perspectives from institutional and resource dependence theory (RDT), we theorize that directors drawn from governmental and commercial elites act as boundary-spanning agents of institutional contagion, transmitting international governance norms across firms and jurisdictions. Institutional economics explains how demographically narrow polities concentrate elite power, while institutional contagion and RDT illuminate how firms conform isomorphically to either indigenous opaque network governance, or internationally legitimate investor norms. Using a unique dataset of 183 headquartered across eight Caribbean exchanges we find that both governmental and commercial elite directors are positively associated with the adoption of Anglo-American corporate governance practices. Governmental elites exert nearly twice the influence of commercial elites, though their effect weakens in offshore jurisdictions. The study advances understanding of how elite agency mediates the global diffusion of governance practices and reveals how institutional design conditions the transfer of international governance norms.
Hearn, Bruce
45dccea3-9631-4e5e-914c-385896674dc2
25 July 2025
Hearn, Bruce
45dccea3-9631-4e5e-914c-385896674dc2
Hearn, Bruce
(2025)
Offshore paragons or pariahs: the unique corporate governance influences of small emerging offshore economies.
Academy of Management [AOM] annual meeting 2025, Copenhagen Business School, Copenhagen, Denmark, Copenhagen, Denmark.
25 - 29 Jul 2025.
40 pp
.
Record type:
Conference or Workshop Item
(Paper)
Abstract
This study investigates how elite non-executive directors shape firms’adoption of Anglo-American corporate governance in offshore and emerging economies. By integrating perspectives from institutional and resource dependence theory (RDT), we theorize that directors drawn from governmental and commercial elites act as boundary-spanning agents of institutional contagion, transmitting international governance norms across firms and jurisdictions. Institutional economics explains how demographically narrow polities concentrate elite power, while institutional contagion and RDT illuminate how firms conform isomorphically to either indigenous opaque network governance, or internationally legitimate investor norms. Using a unique dataset of 183 headquartered across eight Caribbean exchanges we find that both governmental and commercial elite directors are positively associated with the adoption of Anglo-American corporate governance practices. Governmental elites exert nearly twice the influence of commercial elites, though their effect weakens in offshore jurisdictions. The study advances understanding of how elite agency mediates the global diffusion of governance practices and reveals how institutional design conditions the transfer of international governance norms.
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HEARN Offshore Political Economy - Sept-25
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Published date: 25 July 2025
Venue - Dates:
Academy of Management [AOM] annual meeting 2025, Copenhagen Business School, Copenhagen, Denmark, Copenhagen, Denmark, 2025-07-25 - 2025-07-29
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Local EPrints ID: 510391
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/510391
PURE UUID: 75d49cbc-5319-4552-8054-2d1cf47e7413
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Date deposited: 30 Mar 2026 16:38
Last modified: 31 Mar 2026 01:57
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