The Internal Governance of Firms

The Internal Governance of Firms

Viral Acharya, Stewart Myers, Raghuram Rajan

Series number :

Serial Number: 
239/2009

Date posted :

May 01 2009

Last revised :

November 25 2018
SSRN Share

Keywords

  • Agency theory • 
  • short-termism • 
  • Corporate governance • 
  • dividends • 
  • internal orga-nization

We develop a model of internal governance where the self-serving actions of top management are limited by the potential reaction of subordinates. Internal governance can mitigate agency problems and ensure that firms have substantial value, even with little or no external governance by investors.

External governance, even if crude and uninformed, can complement internal governance and improve efficiency. This leads to a theory of investment and dividend policy, where dividends are paid by self-interested CEOs to maintain a balance between internal and external control. Our paper can explain why partnerships work well even if control rights are concentrated at the top, why a public firm’s shares have value even when shareholders have limited power, and when structuring an entity as a publicly-held firm is better than structuring it as a partnership.

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Authors

Professor
Real name: 
Viral Acharya
Fellow, Research Member
Leonard N. Stern School of Business, New York University