IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/corgov/v11y2003i3p180-188.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Audit Committees: begging the question?

Author

Listed:
  • Laura F. Spira

Abstract

Audit committees have become a standard feature of corporate governance in UK listed companies since the publication of the Cadbury Committee's report in 1992. Despite some initial sceptical comment, their widespread adoption has apparently been uncontroversial. However, a decade later, remarkably little is known about how they operate and whether they are effective in providing the benefits anticipated by Cadbury. In the aftermath of Enron, expectations of the audit committee role in supporting auditor independence are likely to intensify. A key feature of audit committee activity – indeed, of the role of the non‐executive director – appears to be the asking of questions, but the practical link between the questioning process and the achievement of the benefits outlined by the proponents of audit committees remains obscure. This paper argues that both the content and context of the questioning process deserve further examination if audit committee activity is to be seen as anything more than a ceremonial performance.

Suggested Citation

  • Laura F. Spira, 2003. "Audit Committees: begging the question?," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 11(3), pages 180-188, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:corgov:v:11:y:2003:i:3:p:180-188
    DOI: 10.1111/1467-8683.00317
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8683.00317
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/1467-8683.00317?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stiles, Philip & Taylor, Bernard, 2001. "Boards at Work: How Directors View their Roles and Responsibilities," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198288763.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. G. Sarens & I. De Beelde, 2006. "Internal audit: the expert in providing comfort to the audit committee. The case of risk management and internal control," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 06/428, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
    2. Sarens, Gerrit & De Beelde, Ignace & Everaert, Patricia, 2009. "Internal audit: A comfort provider to the audit committee," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 90-106.
    3. Jonas Oliveira & Lúcia Lima Rodrigues & Russell Craig, 2011. "Risk-related disclosures by non-finance companies: Portuguese practices and disclosure characteristics," Managerial Auditing Journal, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 26(9), pages 817-839, October.
    4. Sumaira Ashraf & Elisabete G. S. Félix & Zélia Serrasqueiro, 2022. "Does board committee independence affect financial distress likelihood? A comparison of China with the UK," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 39(2), pages 723-761, June.
    5. Bouaziz, Zied & Triki, Mohamed, 2012. "L’impact de la présence des comités d’audit sur la performance financière des entreprises tunisiennes [The impact of the presence of audit committees on the financial performance of Tunisian compan," MPRA Paper 42175, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. C. Piot & L. Kermiche, 2009. "A quoi servent les comités d'audit ? Un regard sur la recherche empirique," Post-Print halshs-00537952, HAL.
    7. Muqaddas Khalid & Qaisar Abbas & Fizzah Malik & Shahid Ali, 2020. "Impact of audit committee attributes on financial distress: Evidence from Pakistan," International Journal of Financial Engineering (IJFE), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 7(01), pages 1-19, March.
    8. Li, Jing & Mangena, Musa & Pike, Richard, 2012. "The effect of audit committee characteristics on intellectual capital disclosure," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 98-110.
    9. Ionica Oncioiu & Anca-Gabriela Petrescu & Florentina-Raluca Bîlcan & Marius Petrescu & Melinda Timea Fülöp & Dan Ioan Topor, 2020. "The Influence of Corporate Governance Systems on a Company’s Market Value," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(8), pages 1-15, April.
    10. Ismail Adelopo & Kumba Jallow & Peter Scott, 2012. "Multiple large ownership structure, audit committee activity and audit fees," Journal of Applied Accounting Research, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 13(2), pages 100-121, September.
    11. Miglani, Seema & Ahmed, Kamran & Henry, Darren, 2015. "Voluntary corporate governance structure and financial distress: Evidence from Australia," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 18-30.
    12. Marlene Davies, 2009. "Effective working relationships between audit committees and internal audit—the cornerstone of corporate governance in local authorities, a Welsh perspective," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 13(1), pages 41-73, May.
    13. Julia Yonghua Wu & Ronán Feehily & Beverley Rae Lord, 2022. "The Corporate Governance Role of Audit Committees: Through the Lenses of New Zealand Institutional Investors," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 32(1), pages 63-76, March.
    14. Annie Ng Cheng San & M. Krishna Moorthy & Choe Kum Lung, 2012. "Perceived Social Power and Audit Committee Effectiveness in Malaysia: The Conceptual Model," International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, Human Resource Management Academic Research Society, International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, vol. 2(1), pages 162-175, January.
    15. Dominic S.B. Soh & Nonna Martinov-Bennie, 2011. "The internal audit function: Perceptions of internal audit roles, effectiveness and evaluation," Managerial Auditing Journal, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 26(7), pages 605-622, July.
    16. Angus Duff, 2009. "Measuring audit quality in an era of change: An empirical investigation of UK audit market stakeholders in 2002 and 2005," Managerial Auditing Journal, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 24(5), pages 400-422, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Paolo Tenuta & Domenico Rocco Cambrea & Debora Fazzari, 2018. "Are All Independent Directors the Same? Evidence from Italian Listed Companies," International Journal of Business and Management, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 13(9), pages 1-78, August.
    2. Leo Vashkor Dewri, 2022. "A Critical Assessment of Interrelationship Among Corporate Governance, Financial Performance, Refined Economic Value Added to Measure Firm Value and Return on Stock," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 13(4), pages 2718-2759, December.
    3. David Weitzner & Theo Peridis, 2011. "Corporate Governance as Part of the Strategic Process: Rethinking the Role of the Board," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 102(1), pages 33-42, March.
    4. Franco Ernesto Rubino & Paolo Tenuta & Domenico Rocco Cambrea, 2017. "Board characteristics effects on performance in family and non-family business: a multi-theoretical approach," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 21(3), pages 623-658, September.
    5. Nguyen, Thi Tuyet Mai, 2017. "An examination of independent directors in Vietnam," OSF Preprints ay6dv, Center for Open Science.
    6. Boxer, Rosie & Berry, Aidan & Perren, Lew, 2012. "Differing perceptions of non-executive directors’ roles in UK SMEs: Governance conundrum or cultural anomaly?," Accounting forum, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 38-50.
    7. Coral Ingley & Jens Mueller & Graeme Cocks, 2011. "The financial crisis, investor activists and corporate strategy: will this mean shareholders in the boardroom?," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 15(4), pages 557-587, November.
    8. Eythor Ivar Jonsson, 2005. "The Role Model of the Board: a preliminary study of the roles of Icelandic boards," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(5), pages 710-717, September.
    9. Yu, Mei & Ashton, John K., 2015. "Board leadership structure for Chinese public listed companies," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 236-248.
    10. Rose N. Mkalama & Vincent N. Machuki, 2019. "Top Management Demographics and Performance: An Empirical Investigation of Kenyan State Corporations," International Journal of Business Administration, International Journal of Business Administration, Sciedu Press, vol. 10(1), pages 1-19, January.
    11. Andreassen, Hege K. & Kjekshus, Lars Erik & Tjora, Aksel, 2015. "Survival of the project: A case study of ICT innovation in health care," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 62-69.
    12. Massicotte, Steeve & Henri, Jean-François, 2021. "The use of management accounting information by boards of directors to oversee strategy implementation," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(3).
    13. Saim Kashmiri & Cameron Duncan Nicol & Liwu Hsu, 2017. "Birds of a feather: intra-industry spillover of the Target customer data breach and the shielding role of IT, marketing, and CSR," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 45(2), pages 208-228, March.
    14. Reggy Hooghiemstra & Jaap Manen, 2004. "Non-executive directors in the Netherlands: another expectations gap?," Accounting and Business Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(1), pages 25-41.
    15. Hongjin Zhu & Pengji Wang & Chris Bart, 2016. "Board Processes, Board Strategic Involvement, and Organizational Performance in For-profit and Non-profit Organizations," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 136(2), pages 311-328, June.
    16. Laura Padilla-Angulo, 2020. "The impact of board diversity on strategic change: a stakeholder perspective," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 24(4), pages 927-952, December.
    17. Victor Dulewicz & Peter Herbert, 2004. "Does the Composition and Practice of Boards of Directors Bear Any Relationship to the Performance of their Companies?," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(3), pages 263-280, July.
    18. Fabio Zona & Alessandro Zattoni, 2007. "Beyond the Black Box of Demography: board processes and task effectiveness within Italian firms," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 15(5), pages 852-864, September.
    19. Ahsan Habib & Md. Borhan Uddin Bhuiyan & Mostafa Monzur Hasan, 2018. "Firm life cycle and advisory directors," Australian Journal of Management, Australian School of Business, vol. 43(4), pages 575-592, November.
    20. Niamh Brennan, 2010. "A review of corporate governance research : an Irish perspective," Open Access publications 10197/2962, Research Repository, University College Dublin.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:corgov:v:11:y:2003:i:3:p:180-188. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0964-8410&site=1 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.