La construction collective de l'indépendance du commissaire aux comptes: la place du comité d'audit

Tiphaine Compernolle

ACCRA, 2009, vol. 15, issue 3, 91-116

Abstract: Although external auditor?s independence is usually described as an individual characteristic, it can be considered as a collective construction on which the audit committee exerts influence. To explore this influence, the study relies on 24 interviews, analyzed from the theoretical perspective proposed by Crozier and Friedberg (1977). My analysis indicates power games taking place between directors, external auditors and the financial management. These power games would play a key role in the construction of external auditor?s independence. More particularly, these games would be sources of constraints, of comfort and of opportunities for external auditors in their « quest » of independence. As such, the article proposes an innovative view of the concept of independence : independence being at the confluence of numerous subjectivities interlinked in various power games.

Keywords: auditor independence; audit committee; power games (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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