When does ownership matter? Board characteristics and behavior
研究了所有权结构如何影响董事会的监督职能，发现所有权分散时董事会独立性与审计服务互补，而所有权集中时则相互替代，且控股股东类型也会影响这一关系。
We develop a contingency approach to explain how firm ownership influences the monitoring function of the board—measured as the magnitude of external audit fees contracted by the board—by extending agency theory to incorporate the resource dependence notion that boards have distinct incentives and abilities to monitor management. Analyses of data on C ontinental E uropean companies reveal that while board independence and audit services are complementary when ownership is dispersed, this is not the case when ownership is concentrated—suggesting that ownership concentration and board composition become substitutes in terms of monitoring management. Additional analysis shows that the relationship between board composition and external audit fees is also contingent upon the type of the controlling shareholder . Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.