Transnational Private Authority and Corporate Governance

Compared to the various forms of intergovernmental or public private cooperation, transnational private self-regulation is a rarely studied case of global economic governance. Furthermore, existing research on transnational self-regulation has neglected the issue of corporate governance. Transnational private self-regulation appears to be at the core of current pressures for convergence of national models of capitalism. Three features of private self-regulation are singled out for a more detailed study, namely the work of rating agencies, private codes of 'good corporate governance' and the transnational harmonization of accounting standards. The chapter concludes that the increasing role of transnational private self-regulation raises important normative concerns and, more particularly, asks for the identification of alternative agency.