Family, governmental, domestic corporations and board of directors and audit committee effectiveness in GCC

Abstract

This study aims at investigating the association between ownership structure (government ownership, family ownership and domestic corporate ownership) and the interaction of board of directors effectiveness and audit committee effectiveness by GCC listed companies. The study utilizes a cross-sectional analysis of 492 firm-year observations during the 2006-2010 period. A pooled OLS regression analysis is used to estimate the associations proposed in the hypotheses. The study finds that government and domestic corporate ownerships are positively related to the effectiveness of board of directors and audit committee. However, such association could not be reported by the family ownership. The results of this study suggest that government-owned and domestic corporate-owned companies are characterized to have good corporate governance practices in terms of board of directors and audit committee as internal control and monitoring mechanisms. Further, the results of this study contribute to the existing theory and empirical evidence of how the effectiveness of board of directors and audit committee is related to monitoring and controlling ownership type. This study offers policy-makers additional evidence to be used for setting up and/or enacting regulations in GCC.