SOEs ownership and control: Indipendence and competence of boards members

The public presence is a feature of the European countries. Reforms of State-Owned Enterprises (SOE) asked for more autonomy and new formal control systems. In OECD countries, SOEs cover a significant economical and social role. However, SOEs raise some issues. They present inefficiencies and low profitability, related to their poor corporate governance, in particular with respect to the role of their boards of directors. Ownership is a key element, underlying different corporate governance regimes, but very few empirical studies investigate the influences of state ownership on board’s composition. Two attributes are particularly relevant: board independence and board competence. The paper aims at highlighting: (1) the components that assign a critical role to a SOE’s board; (2) the specificities of independence and competence of board members in a public governance perspective; (3) the effects of the structure of the ownership on these board’s attributes. Hypotheses are tested on the population of the 29 Italian SOEs directly managed by the Italian Ministry of Economics and Finance.