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Abstract

This paper focuses on Thai managers' perceptions of the nature of corporate governance in Thailand since the Asian
financial crisis of 1997. It contributes to the agency theory literature by identifying relations between families, boards and corporate governance. Thailand, like most economies based on private enterprise has had serious
company failures. Since 1997, many of these have been attributed to the Asian financial crisis, but further
investigation has shown that the underlying weaknesses of Thai corporate structures made them highly exposed to
such crises. Prior to the Asian financial crisis, Thai corporate governance practices were characterised by ineffective boards of directors, weak internal controls, unreliable financial reporting and disclosure, inadequate protection of minority shareholder rights, poor audits and generally lacked enforcement to ensure regulatory compliance. Additionally, the dominance of family control over business operations was prevalent. The international corporate governance system assumes a separation of ownership and control, a questionable assumption in the Thai context. The important issue pursued in this paper is whether corporate governance in Thailand has improved since the Asian financial crisis. The results show that Thai companies are now characterised by the presence of independent directors on their boards, and that Thai boards are active, engaged, and take their responsibilities very seriously.

Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Jongsureyapart, C and Wise, V
Journal or Publication Title:	Global Business and Economics Anthology
Publisher:	B&ESI
ISSN:	1553-1392
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