Business Ethics and Corporate Governance, Second Edition

DEVELOPMENTS IN THE US

Corporate governance gained importance with the occurrence of the Watergate scandal in the United States. Thereafter, as a result of subsequent investigations, US regulatory and legislative bodies were able to highlight control failures that had allowed several major corporations to make illegal political contributions and to bribe government officials. This led to the development of the Foreign and Corrupt Practices Act of 1977 that contained specific provisions regarding the establishment, maintenance and review of systems of internal control. This was followed in 1979 by the Securities and Exchange Commission’s proposals for mandatory reporting on internal financial controls. In 1985, following a series of high profile ...