Symmetric independence relations are often studied using graphical representations. Ancestral graphs or acyclic directed mixed graphs with m-separation provide classes of symmetric graphical ...independence models that are closed under marginalization. Asymmetric independence relations appear naturally for multivariate stochastic processes, for instance, in terms of local independence. However, no class of graphs representing such asymmetric independence relations, which is also closed under marginalization, has been developed. We develop the theory of directed mixed graphs with μ-separation and show that this provides a graphical independence model class which is closed under marginalization and which generalizes previously considered graphical representations of local independence.
Several graphs may encode the same set of independence relations and this means that in many cases only an equivalence class of graphs can be identified from observational data. For statistical applications, it is therefore pivotal to characterize graphs that induce the same independence relations. Our main result is that for directed mixed graphs with μ-separation each equivalence class contains a maximal element which can be constructed from the independence relations alone. Moreover, we introduce the directed mixed equivalence graph as the maximal graph with dashed and solid edges. This graph encodes all information about the edges that is identifiable from the independence relations, and furthermore it can be computed efficiently from the maximal graph.
It pays to have friends Hwang, Byoung-Hyoun; Kim, Seoyoung
Journal of financial economics,
07/2009, Volume:
93, Issue:
1
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Currently, a director is classified as independent if he or she has neither financial nor familial ties to the CEO or to the firm. We add another dimension: social ties. Using a unique data set, we ...find that 87% of boards are conventionally independent but that only 62% are conventionally and socially independent. Furthermore, firms whose boards are conventionally and socially independent award a significantly lower level of compensation, exhibit stronger pay-performance sensitivity, and exhibit stronger turnover-performance sensitivity than firms whose boards are only conventionally independent. Our results suggest that social ties do matter and that, consequently, a considerable percentage of the conventionally independent boards are substantively not.
SYNOPSIS The objective of this paper is to provide a systematic evaluation of independence as a foundational element of the auditing profession. We maintain that while independence is a theoretically ...appealing construct, it is fraught with practical problems surrounding its implementation, monitoring, and regulation. We analyze the current oversight of auditor independence and evaluate the need for auditor independence from the perspective of information users and information producers. In the process, we discuss important implications and intractable challenges that affect one or more parties involved in the financial-reporting process. Finally, we carefully evaluate alternatives to the current regulatory approach for managing auditor independence (i.e., proscribing various auditor-client relationships). We conclude that increasing audit committees' responsibilities for monitoring the auditor's independence—along with additional disclosure about threats and safeguards to auditor independence—is worthy of further consideration and debate as a path toward addressing the auditor independence conundrum.
Financial scandals such as the Enron-Andersen debacle provoke concerns that auditors lack independence when faced with influential clients. Unlike previous studies that examine whether client ...influence affects audit quality on ongoing engagements (providing mixed results), we investigate whether client influence (which engenders “independence risk”) at the audit-office level affects auditor resignations from high engagement-risk clients. We construct summary measures of engagement risk, using client disclosures on Form 8-K filings, potential risk factors (e.g., litigation risk), and auditor action (e.g., issuance of a going concern opinion) on the previous year’s financial statements. Focusing on risky clients, we find that auditors are more likely on average to resign from influential clients, and this positive association holds for auditors that are less likely to have mechanisms in place to mitigate independence risk. Also, importantly, influential clients are prevalent across the spectrum of client size, and the positive association between client influence and auditor resignations holds for both large and small clients.
This paper explores the strength of internal corporate governance as a determining factor in a firm's addressing the sustainable development goals (SDGs) proposed by the United Nations. Using a ...European sample of analysis from 2016 to 2017, the paper examines CEO independence, board composition and board attendance as internal corporate governance factors that affect a firm's commitment to sustainable development. By employing several regression analyses, the evidence supports the assertion that greater corporate governance strength, from an internal perspective, increases the propensity to report SDGs in firms' sustainability reports. In addition, results confirm that CEO non‐duality and board independence act individually as determinants of a firm's contribution to the 2030 Agenda.
Anatomy of a Civil War demonstrates the destructive nature of war, ranging from the physical to the psychosocial, as well as war’s detrimental effects on the environment. Despite such horrific ...aspects, evidence suggests that civil war is likely to generate multilayered outcomes. To examine the transformative aspects of civil war, Mehmet Gurses draws on an original survey conducted in Turkey, where a Kurdish armed group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), has been waging an intermittent insurgency for Kurdish self-rule since 1984. Findings from a probability sample of 2,100 individuals randomly selected from three major Kurdish-populated provinces in the eastern part of Turkey, coupled with insights from face-to-face in-depth interviews with dozens of individuals affected by violence, provide evidence for the multifaceted nature of exposure to violence during civil war. Just as the destructive nature of war manifests itself in various forms and shapes, wartime experiences can engender positive attitudes toward women, create a culture of political activism, and develop secular values at the individual level. In addition, wartime experiences seem to robustly predict greater support for political activism. Nonetheless, changes in gender relations and the rise of a secular political culture appear to be primarily shaped by wartime experiences interacting with insurgent ideology.
This book reopens the debate on colonial nationalisms, going beyond 'derivative', 'borrowed', political and modernist paradigms. It introduces the conceptual category of samaj to demonstrate how ...indigenous socio-cultural origins in Bengal interacted with late-colonial discourses to produce the notion of a nation. Samaj (a historical society and an idea-in-practice) was a site for reconfiguring antecedents and negotiating fragmentation. Drawing on indigenous sources, this study shows how caste, class, ethnicity, region and community were refracted to conceptualise wider unities. The mapping of cultural continuities through change facilitates a more nuanced investigation of the ontology of nationhood, seeing it as related to, but more than political nationalism. It outlines a fresh paradigm for recalibrating postcolonial identities, offering interpretive strategies to mediate fragmentation.
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