Financial Participation: Does the Risk Transfer Story Hold in France?

Several articles report a positive effect of financial participation (profit sharing (PS) and employee share ownership) on firms' economic performance. This increase can be obtained in two main ways: by increasing the effort (extrinsic, intrinsic or commitment) of workers, directly or indirectly through worker selection; or by transferring more risk to the workers. The question is, of course, not neutral. Indeed, if the risk transfer story is true then it means that the increase of economic performance is obtained at the expense of workers, who take on the burden of more risks. The question is especially important in France where financial participation is associated with tax exemption for firms and where it is forbidden by law to substitute base wage and PS. The purpose of our article is to use an employer–employee dataset to answer the question of whether financial participation schemes are mainly designed as a risk transfer (from firms to workers) device.     

The Governance of Accounting Academia: Issues for a Debate

Abstract

Philosophy and sociology of science have devoted significant attention to processes which define what counts as valid scientific knowledge thus making the producers of such knowledge legitimate academics at the expense of those who do not conform to the cliché. In accounting, too, a vibrant debate has augmented our understanding of the conditions which make certain kinds of accounting knowledge more acceptable than others. The debate included, but was not limited to, issues such as, the institutional arrangements of accounting academic associations and doctoral training regimes and how these shape journals' editorial boards and the selection of published articles. This introduction aims to reopen that debate on the two realms of institutions and practices. In terms of institutional arrangements, we note relevant changes in the forces which contribute to define the quality and relevance of accounting knowledge. We discuss the institutional space towards which accounting departments and scholars are increasingly migrating, that is, business schools. These are often separated from universities and operate under pressures which are sometimes only marginally academic in nature. In terms of practices, we observe changes in academic training regimes which favour the proliferation of opportunistic behaviours. These changes call for a debate on the governance of accounting academia, if academia is to be a knowledge and ethical, and not simply rather a business enterprise.     

Private benefits extraction by the initial owner and the dynamic of ownership and control post‐initial public offering

We investigate the relation between the private benefits' extraction by the initial controlling shareholder and the likelihood of the change of control post‐initial public offering (IPO) in France. We find that (a) in a weak investor protection context, the initial controlling shareholder with high private benefits of control is less likely to relinquish control 5‐years post‐IPO. (b) The initial controlling shareholder extracts private benefits of control through high voting rights and when the founder is involved in control at IPO. (c) Family controlling shareholders are less likely to end up with change of control post‐IPO than nonfamily ones. Such behavior is more pronounced with substantial voting rights, when the founder is in control and when the founder or his heir is an executive director. High private benefits of control contribute therefore to foster the survival of the initial controlling shareholder post‐IPO. Our findings are robust even after using alternative proxies of private benefits of control and also after running a survival analysis.     

The dark side of co-creation in a tourism experience: an exploratory study of the different types of ill-being

The present article aims at exploring the concept of ill-being by setting a typology of tourism experiences and the associated forms of ill-being. A qualitative study was conducted on 31 French-speaking tourists. It reveals different types of tourism experiences (commercial/non-commercial) and forms of participation (interaction/active participation). Several types of ill-being have been identified. Managerial recommendations are provided to tourism professionals on how to improve the experiences of their customers according to each type of ill-being.     

Public value,institutional logics and practice variation during austerity localism at Newcastle City Council

This article outlines how a local authority, Newcastle City Council (NCC), employed a public value strategy to address austerity localism. Borrowing from neo-institutional theory, it traces how organizational change constituted also a variation of democratic deliberation practices. Legitimation of budget decisions against central government cuts involved such practice variations as public consultations to change NCC’s vision and mobilize support, building operational capacity beyond the organization, and new accountings for measuring public value. Insofar as such organization changes constituted instances of institutional entrepreneurship of local government as a key democratic institution, our article refines existing theorizing of public value accounting.     

Transforming audit technologies: Business risk audit methodologies and the audit field

Business Risk Audit (BRA) methodologies have been promoted by a number of the large audit firms in response, they claim, to the challenges of the information age and corporate clients’ needs for assurance. This paper subjects their claim to critical scrutiny, drawing on the perspectives of neo-institutional theories of legitimacy, the sociology of professional knowledge and the sociology of science and technology. To bring into play new Business Risk Audit methodologies a number of the larger firms have sought, through their auditing practice, to renegotiate the bases of their professional identity and status within audit firms and to widen their jurisdictional claims over other areas of expertise. These moves have been accompanied by the legitimation and embedding of Business Risk Audit in revised constructions of the market for audit, in abstract academic knowledges, reforms of professional education, and professional regulations. In providing a constructivist account of Business Risk Audit technologies, we argue for a theory of audit change that recognises (i) the centrality of legitimation processes and (ii) the co-construction of audit technology and the audit field.