Corporate Governance and M&A Performance: A Systematic Review of Literature

Mergers and Acquisitions are generally undertaken for strategic purposes but from a corporate governance standpoint, they can be regarded as those events that can intensify agency conflicts. Through this study, therefore, an attempt has been made to systematically review the existing literature on the role of various corporate governance attributes in minimizing agency conflicts that may arise during mergers and acquisitions. A sample of 116 research articles was identified that were clustered into three broad themes viz. board structure, ownership structure and compensation structure. The findings of the study shed light on the importance of each of the governance attributes classified under these three themes during mergers & acquisitions. Further, the study also highlights the underexplored areas that future researchers can undertake to contribute to this research stream.