About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractPurpose -The purpose of this study is to understand the power dynamics of the boards of directors in family-owned and listed Turkish companies. Power and dominance in the boardroom can be studied in relation to three variables: the institutional environment in which the firm is embedded; the structural configurations of the board; and the top manager's propensity to exercise his/her power resources. Focusing on the board level, this paper aims to conceptualize power dynamics as being composed of structural attributes, roles assumed, responsibilities, dependency and representation.Design/methodology/approach -The research domain of this exploratory study is family-owned and listed companies operating on the Istanbul Stock Exchange (ISE). The data for the study were collected from three different sources: a survey administered to members of the boards of directors; discourse analysis of corporate governance compliance reports of the same companies; and in-depth interviews conducted with board members.Findings -This study shows that on a typical board of directors of a family-owned and listed Turkish company, the interests of owners and managers are aligned and other stakeholders are not represented; the role of the board is confined to visibility and legitimacy and does not include control.Originality/value -This paper argues that theories developed for Anglo-Saxon equity-market based business systems have limited exploratory power for an emerging economy -namely Turkey -that is based on a business system characterized by close co-operation between the state, family-owned businesses and financial markets.

Purpose This paper aims to study how activists involved in consumer-initiated cooperatives, in a specific context, challenge the practices of the neoliberal system and develop counter-practices that are ingrained with their values. It aims to access the transformative capacity and inclusiveness of consumer-initiated cooperatives and the role played by prefigurative practices in changing the status quo. Three practices – defetishization of agricultural commodities, surplus generation and distribution, prefiguration – that enable the inclusion of those groups who are marginalized in the food production and consumption nexus by neoliberal policies are identified. Design/methodology/approach The findings of this paper were developed from 23 unstructured interviews, participant observation and analysis of the social media accounts of five consumer-initiated cooperatives located in different districts of Istanbul and which are involved in a collective response to the neoliberal policies. Findings The study discusses that, in a specific context, political events and economic policies can be a catalyst for the initiation of alternative consumer-initiated cooperatives. The findings indicate that these organizations can develop and articulate prefigurative practices that are influential in transforming the prevailing capitalist food provisioning system to be more inclusive. Research limitations/implications The findings offer an alternative view to the dominant capitalist logic and advance the concept of how the economic sphere can be re-politicized and how the persevering notion of financial performance is resolved by invoking values of inclusion, solidarity, responsibility and sharing. The findings are based on the study of five cases in a specific context during a specific period. Originality/value This paper focuses on cooperatives owned and governed by activist consumers and presents results concerning their underlying practices for creating a food provisioning system that is inclusive and aiming for social justice and equality. Similarly, it provides evidence of how local political and economic conditions influence the appropriation and development of these practices – commodity defetishization, surplus distribution and prefiguration.

Corporate governance has been one of the major issues studied by academicians in management and economics. Recent problems faced by various companies in certain economic systems forced the widespread adoption and implementation of corporate governance logic and principles by various types of companies. This study describes the successful implementation of corporate governance (CG) principles by Dogan Yayın Holding (DYH) which is Turkey's leading media-entertainment conglomerate. The company's success in implementing the CG principles led to the improvement of its company image, gaining prestige in the eyes of foreign institutional investors, and improving its internal and external control mechanisms. Considering all of these implementations, one can realize the successful involvement of DYH in pursuing good CG practices in Turkey.

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