Language: English

Speaker: Steen Thomsen (Center for Corporate Governance, Copenhagen Business School)

Title: Comparative Corporate Governance: Japan, Southeast Asia and the Nordics

Abstract: Despite decades of convergence, national governance models remain resolutely unique. We compare corporate governance in Japan, Southeast Asia (Thailand, Singapore) and the Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden). Even in its modern form Japanese corporate governance appears to be distinctly different from both US and European models because of its strong focus on loosely affiliated business groups and managerial control. Thailand retains significant family influence behind the scenes despite strong compliance with good governance practices. Singapore has developed its own successful brand of government-linked enterprises. The small Nordics appear to be content with their “cuddly capitalism” based on high social trust, corruption control and rule of law.  We can perhaps see this vindication of uniqueness as expressions of self-organized mimetic pressures that foster path dependency in corporate governance.

Short Bio: Steen Thomsen is Novo Nordisk Foundation Professor of Enterprise Foundations at the Center for Corporate Governance, Copenhagen Business School. He specializes in corporate governance as a teacher, researcher, consultant and commentator.  His research is currently focused on enterprise foundations – foundations that own business firms.  Steen has served as a non-executive director in several business companies and nonprofits. He is a founding board member of Boardmeter, which does software-based board evaluations, and chairman of the Pluto Nature Foundation, which seeks to preserve forgotten nature biodiversity.