Professor Thomas Clarke

Thomas Clarke is Professor of Management and Head of the School of Management at the University of Technology, Sydney. He was awarded his doctorate in Industrial and Business Studies from the University of Warwick Business School, UK. He was previously DBM Professor of Corporate Governance at the Leeds Business School, UK (1992-1999), and Visiting Professor at the China Europe International Business School, Shanghai (1995-1998); FGV Business School, Sao Paulo, Brazil and UAM Business School, Mexico City. He was a member of the Task Force of the RSA Tomorrow's Company Inquiry in the UK from 1992-1995 which was funded by 25 international companies and examined the sources of sustainable business success, constructing a model of the inclusive company alert to all stakeholder interests, that has influenced the thinking of the current review of Company Law taking place in the UK. In 1998/1999 he attended the OECD in Paris to help develop the international corporate governance code that has now been adopted by governments throughout the industrial and developing world. He is a member of the advisory board of the Strategic Partnership an international strategic management consultancy company and he has specialised as a consultant to the board of directors of international intellectual property rights companies. He is a member of the Editorial Board of the journal, Corporate Governance - An International Review, Oxford: Blackwell

In 1993-95 he conducted a strategic review of the corporate governance of the Performing Right Society (PRS) Ltd published as Playing in Tune: The Corporate Governance of the Performing Right Society (PRS 1994). This report proposed a new board and committee structure and operation for the Society which at the time had 26,000 members internationally, approximately 750,000 individual intellectual property rights registered, was responsible for collecting the world-wide royalties from all media, and distributed £230 million in royalties per annum. This report was put to the Board, AGM, and EGM of the company and was accepted for implementation. Subsequently the report was published by the UK Monopolies and Mergers Commission following its inquiry into the industry in a report on Performing Rights: A Report on the Supply in the UK of the Services of Administering Performing Rights and Film Synchronisation Rights, MMC, HMSO, pp 275-303. Subsequently he became adviser to the Board of the newly formed UK Performing Artists Media Rights Association on board structure and operation, and selection of the chief executive (1995-1996). Over the last 20 years he has served as a director on the boards of a wide range of public, private and third sector companies, including in the role of chairman. He is an Associate Member of the University of Cambridge Judge Management Institute's Centre for International Business and Management. In 2001 he was asked to address an international colloquium on corporate governance, convened by INSEAD Singapore, and attended by the chief executive of the Japan Trading Organisation (JETRO) and senior officials of the Japanese Ministry of Trade and Industry (MITI), present in Singapore for the signing of Japan's first free trade agreement.

As Director of the Key University Research Centre for Corporate Governance research at UTS, he leads a large inter-disciplinary team of researchers examining international comparative corporate governance, the financial aspects of corporate governance, directors duties and the role of the board, and legal and ethical aspects of governance including triple bottom line reporting. He is interested in the critique of shareholder value and the relationship of governance to strategy and innovation. His broader research interests include management and business paradigms; globalisation; international best practice in knowledge management; the knowledge economy; privatization and deregulation; management reform in China and SE Asia; sustainable enterprise; stakeholder management; media and communications; new organizational forms; and the governance of knowledge-based business.

Selected Publications

Professor Clarke has published a number of books, including Rethinking the Company 1994 (London: Financial Times Publishing) which has been translated into five languages, International Privatisation: Strategies and Practices 1994 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter), The Political Economy of Privatisation 1995, (London: Routledge) (with Christos Pitelis of Cambridge University), and with Stewart Clegg Changing Paradigms: The Transformation of Management Knowledge for the 21 st Century 2000 (London: HarperCollins Business), which examines the transformation of business enterprises in the new global competitive environment and the sources of sustainable business. With Christine Rollo he published International Best Practice: Case Studies in Knowledge Management (Sydney, Standards Australia 2001).

More recently his work has focused on corporate governance with the publication of Theories of Corporate Governance (Routledge 2004); International Corporate Governance, (Routledge 2007); and a five volume edited Major Work Corporate Governance: Critical Perspectives on Business and Management (Routledge 2005). With Marie dela Rama he has edited Corporate Governance and Globalisation (Sage 2006). He has published over 80 articles and book chapters in refereed journals including Long Range Planning; Corporate Governance An International Review; Economic and Industrial Democracy; Business Ethics; International Journal of Training and Development; Creativity and Innovation Management; Journal of General Management; International Journal of Management Review; and Human Relations. He also has published many articles in professional journals including Accountancy, The Banker, and Financial Director.