No abstract

From an international perspective, Australia has been one of the leading jurisdictions for corporate governance reform. Its first corporate governance code predates the Cadbury Report, and Australia is also one of the few countries internationally to have been only marginally affected by the recession that ensued after the Global Financial Crisis. Considerable governance reform has occurred since 2007-8 in Australia, however; much of it occasioned by pressure brought to bear by institutional investors as a reaction to both traditional governance failings and also social and environmental concerns such as a growing awareness of climate change. Institutional influence is primarily associated with the compulsory retirement income system that emerged in the 1980s in light of an economy-wide union campaign. While governance structures are becoming more homogenous, institutional logics reflecting trustees' concerns are driving and shaping this ongoing process. A new approach to corporate engagement has emerged under the influence of investor representative bodies such as the Australian Council of Superannuation Investors that is driving corporate governance change.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to consider the way in which agency theory has crowded out other approaches to understanding the governance of modern businesses. The paper rescues the meaning and context which informed the American corporate governance reform movement originally and demonstrates how the economically predicated agency approach became dominant in academic considerations of corporate governance. Design/methodology/approach – Both primary and secondary sources were considered in a Foucauldian history of ideas approach. Findings – Other approaches to corporate governance have been pushed out of the mainstream of corporate governance discourse by an economic model which excludes many of the key issues which informed the notion originally. Practical implications – Dominant academic attitudes to corporate governance have occluded other ways in which the governance of corporations can be understood. Originality/value – Previous accounts of corporate governance have ignored the alternative approaches represented before agency theory became dominant.

The term "community" has a long and contested lineage in social analysis and debate. This lineage, however, is not generally recognized in policy and public debates on community and bushfire in Australia.