Hearn, Bruce, Roger Strange, and Jenifer Piesse. “Social Elites on the Board and Executive Pay in Developing Countries: Evidence from Africa.” Journal of World Business : JWB 52, no. 2 (2017): 230–43. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jwb.2016.12.004.

This study applies a new multi-focal actor-centered institution-theoretic approach to examine the association between executive pay and the recruitment of social elites to the board of directors in developing countries. Using a sample of 119 initial public offerings (IPOs) from 17 African stock markets to model this relationship, the results suggest that a higher proportion of elites on the board is associated with lower executive pay. This is moderated by institutional quality; that is, lower institutional quality is associated with more directors drawn from social elites and with higher pay, while the opposite is true in higher-institutional-quality environments. The findings confirm the importance of the social environment within which governance is embedded.

Source: Article abstract