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The process of building a corporate governance system in Poland is an ongoing one. It may be assumed, however, that the past ten years have seen the foundation created for the system. The institution of the supervisory board occupies an essential position within the infrastructure. For its part, the developing capital market, with such important institutions as the Securities and Exchange Commission as well as the Stock Market, fills a significant – though not yet broad – supporting function. It must be remembered, however, that the Polish system of corporate governance is still very young and is subject to continuous transformations. To a great extent, the direction of these transformations is marked by the quest for ever more effective solutions in the realm of supervision whilst the pool of experience already accumulated makes possible the implementation of the selected orientation.

The empirical relationship between chief executive officer (CEO) compensation, the investment opportunity set (IOS) and corporate governance mechanisms is analyzed for a sample of 415 Canadian firms in 1997. Results indicate that firms with high IOS pay higher levels of total compensation to their CEOs. In addition, CEOs of high IOS derive a larger proportion of their compensation from performance‐contingent forms of pay such as bonuses, stock option grants and long‐term incentive plans. However, CEOs with weak boards of directors are compensated more than CEOs with powerful boards. Contrary to our expectation, we find that in high IOS firms with weak boards of directors, CEOs seek to have higher proportions of contingent forms of pay in their compensation. An implication of this result is that contingent compensation practices may be a more value‐enhancing form of remuneration for CEOs.

Geographic information systems (GIS) provide unparalleled power to examine social, economic, and political circumstances. As this technology becomes more prominent in the public sector, it brings new challenges to democratic decision making. How we choose to apply this technology will determine the relationship between those who control technology and those who engage in governance. This article provides examples of how GIS is being used for policy implementation and then explores the democratic implications of GIS.

A number of Committees have been set up in recent years to investigate the governance of UK quoted companies. The key one was the Cadbury Committee, which recommended a number of governance structures as examples of best practice. These included the separation of the posts of CEO and chairman, a significant representation of non‐executive directors, the importance of non‐executive director independence and the setting up of board subcommittees. This study finds that there has been widespread adoption of the recommended governance structures. However, there is no clear relationship between governance structures and corporate performance. This raises questions about the most effective type of governance mechanism and whether or not the prescriptive recommendations of Cadbury should be replaced with a more flexible approach.

In analyzing European institutional structures, the multi-level governance literature speaks of mutual interdependence, of cooperative and coordinated processes between different levels of authority. The emergence of these processes is sometimes associated with the disappearance of hierarchical relationships organized across vertical channels of communication. The type of hierarchy, which is declared 'eroded', is not further specified. In the first part of the article a definition of hierarchy is given and an attempt is then made to develop a diversified concept of hierarchy consisting of two types : unilateral and asymmetrically interdependent. The second part applies this modified concept of hierarchy to relationship structures in those federations which are part of European multi-level polity, and examines the types of hierarchy that exist between federal and federated levels when the latter act within the European framework. The external policies of German and Belgian federated units are analyzed in a comparative perspective.

This article retraces the emergence and shows the implications of current regulative frameworks in the field of urban drug policy. Framed by an analytical perspective that is based on the concept of urban governance, the article focuses on the processes by which cooperation and coordination between various conflicting governmental and non‐governmental agencies are achieved to address drug‐related problems in the major agglomerations of Switzerland, as well as in the metropolitan areas of Amsterdam, Glasgow and Frankfurt am Main. In the first part, it is shown that these problems are structured and debated along a conflict between advocates of the public‐health approach and those of the public‐order approach in the field of drug policy, as well as, to a lesser extent, a conflict between core cities and fringe municipalities about spillover effects related to the provision of services for users of illegal drugs. It is argued that this stems from a general tension between the goals of an attractiveness policy aimed at enhancing local economic development, and the necessities of social policy needed to address urban social problems. The second part examines the emergence of mechanisms of governance aimed at addressing drug‐related urban problems. It is argued that a 'social public order' regime emerged to regulate drug‐related urban problems, controlling urban practices of drug users by a combination of police and social work. In addition, it is held that in Switzerland, where social policy is traditionally confined to municipalities, these mechanisms of governance contributed to the emergence of metropolitan regions as new territorial actors in the field of drug policy.Cet article retrace l'apparition et les implications des cadres régulateurs actuels dans le domaine de la politique urbaine contre la drogue. Dans une perspective analytique fondée sur le concept de gouvernance urbaine, il s'attache aux processus qui permettent coopération et coordination entre divers organismes antagonistes, gouvernementaux ou non, pour traiter des problèmes liés à la drogue dans les principales agglomérations suisses, ainsi que dans les zones métropolitaines d'Amsterdam, Glasgow et Francfort‐sur‐le‐Main. La première partie démontre que ces questions sont organisées et discutées au sein d'une opposition entre partisans de l'approche de santé publique et ceux de l'ordre public en matière de politique de lutte contre la drogue, ainsi que, dans une moindre mesure, au sein d'un conflit entre les villes centrales et les municipalités satellites sur les retombées des services mis en place pour les consommateurs de drogues; cette situation résulte d'une tension globale entre les objectifs d'une politique d'attraction visant à favoriser le developpement économique local, et les nécessités d'une politique sociale obligée de traiter les problèmes urbains. La deuxième partie étudie l'émergence de mécanismes de gouvernance en réponse aux problèmes urbains liés à la drogue; ainsi, un régime 'd'ordre public social' a vu le jour, les pratiques urbaines des consommateurs de drogue étant sous le contrôle combiné de la police et des travailleurs sociaux. De plus, en Suisse où la politique sociale est par tradition du ressort des municipalités, certaines zones métropolitaines sont devenues, grâce à ces mécanismes de gouvernance, de nouveaux acteurs territoriaux de la politique publique de lutte contre la drogue.