Big WSJ section on corporate governance

■"Corporate Governance (The Journal Report): Living With Sarbanes-Oxley," by Dina Gullapalli, Wall Street Journal, 2005, p. R1.

■"Corporate Governance (The Journal Report): The Global Agenda: Wherever investors go, demands for better governance follow," by Mary Jacoby, Wall Street Journal, 2005, p. R7.

Great section, full of interesting articles.

Two great PPT slides are to be found: 1) on the historical march of corporate governance (a graphic attached to the first article lists 11 milestones dating back to 1933, with four of the 11 falling in the last five years); and 2) a listing of "notable developments in corporate governance around the globe (associated with the second article.

Real point of second article is one I harp on in Blueprint for Action: attract investors and they'll start making demands for better corporate governance, and that in turn triggers the private sector's higher transaction rates (simply asking for more acts, services, laws, etc.) with the government, thus improving that with time.

As Martin Wolf puts it: good markets need good governments.