Dr. Vanden Bergh Publishes Article in Business and Politics

12/5/2007

Dr. Rick Vanden Bergh, Associate Professor of Business Administration, published an article with co-author Guy Holburn Ivey School of Business in Business & Politics entitled “Targeting Corporate Political Strategy: Theory and Evidence from the U.S. Accounting Industry.”

The authors analyze the interaction between a firm and multiple government institutions to develop predictions about how firms target their political strategies at different branches of government when seeking favorable public policies. They develop a hypothesis that firms will target their resources at the institution that is “pivotal” in the policy-making process. They find empirical support for their thesis in an analysis of how U.S. accounting firms shifted their political campaign contributions between the House and Senate in response to the threat of new regulations governing auditor independence during the 1990s.