Rising Powers and Transnational Private Governance: The International Accounting Standards Board

At first sight, the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) is an unusual subject of study regarding the role of rising powers in multilateral reform, since it is not a multilateral inter-governmental organization, but a case of transnational private governance (Graz and Nolke, 2008; Buthe and Mattli, 2011). The IASB is a private body, comprising a group of 16 experts based in London and financed by the IFRS Foundation. The most important funding sources of the latter are international accounting firms, although the contributions by public bodies have strongly increased over the past few years. Although the IASB recently has been given a Monitoring Board comprised of representatives from inter-governmental organizations, its day-to-day work is firmly in the hands of technical experts, mostly from the private sector. The utilization of accounting standards developed by the IASB, however, has been required or permitted in about 120 countries, among those all G20 member states.