Personal details

• Name: Dr Malcolm Alexander
• Department: School of Arts, Media and Culture
• Institution: Griffith University
• Country: Australia
• Highest Qualification: PhD (1979, McGill University)

Network Related Grants (1999 - present)

• 1999 - 2000 (with Prof. Geoff Kiel, GSM, University of Qld.) ARC Large Grant, File No: A79905918 ($45,000 and $33,000) Beyond the Boardroom: The globalisation of business elite networks in Australia and the locus of business power in the 1990s.
  
  This study of the personal networks and public activities of Australia's business elite (ie, the top managers and directors of the largest 100 companies and government corporations) innovatively combines network analysis and elite studies. Whereas previous studies concentrated on boardroom networks (ie, interlocking directorships), we analyse all affiliations and networks of the business elite. We measure network densities and centralities to test, and move beyond, contending theories about the locus and origins of business community power. We then analyse the global orientations of key networkers to evaluate the commitment to globalisation among Australia's business elite.

Other Network-related Collaborations (1999 - present)

• Social Network Analysis Theme Group:
  Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences (NIAS), Wassenaar, The Netherlands September 1 2000 - June 30, 2001.
  This multinational research group comprised scholars from the Netherlands, Australia, Canada and the US and undertook a comparative analysis of networks of interlocking directors in these countries.
• Interlocking Directorates and Corporate Governance in Australia
  Members: Dr. Malcolm Alexander, Prof. Geoff Kiel and Mr. Gavin Nicholson.
• Social Capital in Rural Communities
  This is a collaboration with a PhD student, Angela Wardell-Johnson. Her thesis examines networks of social capital and affiliation in two rural catchments, one in Queensland and one in Western Australia.

Network-related Publications (1999 - present)

• Malcolm Alexander "Interpersonal Relations and Network Architecture in Affiliation Networks: The Corporate Network in Australia 1996" Proceedings, TASA Annual Conference, Armidale Dec. 2003.
• Malcolm Alexander (2001) "The internal organisation of the Australian corporate elite: A 'small world' analysis" Refereed Conference Paper The Australian Sociological Association, Annual Meetings, December, 2001, University of New South Wales, Sydney. Published in R. van Kreiken et. al. (eds), TASA 2001, Conference Proceedings, Sydney.
• Alexander, M. and G. Kiel (2001) "The board composition of Australia's largest publicly listed companies - an exploratory analysis" ANZAM 2001 (Proceedings), Auckland, December.
• Nicholson, G., G.C. Kiel and M. Alexander (2000) "The Board of Directors - Firm Performance Nexus Revisited", ANZAM 2000 (Proceedings), Sydney, December. [Paper awarded "Best Paper of Conference"]
• Nicholson, G., G.C. Kiel and M. Alexander (2000) "Exploring the Theoretical Link Between Social Capital, Board Roles and Firm Performance", Academy of Management Conference, Canada, August.
• Alexander, Malcolm (1999) "Patterns of Sociological Specialisation: The Internal Structure of TASA Fields of Interest", Nexus, Newsletter of the Australian Sociological Association, Vol. 11, 2, June 1999, pp. 4-6. C3

Career Ten Best Publications

• Malcolm Alexander (2003), "Boardroom networks among Australian company directors, 1976 and 1996: The impact of investor capitalism", Journal of Sociology, Vol. 39 (3) pp. 231-251
• Carroll, William K and M. Alexander (1999) "Finance Capital and Capitalist Class Integration in the 1990s: Networks of Interlocking Directorships in Canada and Australia" (Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology, Vol. 36, No. 3, August: pp; 331-350). C1
• Alexander, Malcolm, (1998) "Big Business and directorship networks: the centralisation of economic power in Australia", Journal of Sociology (formerly Australian and New Zealand Journal of Sociology), Vol. 34, no. 2, August: pp.107-122. C1
• Alexander, Malcolm (with collaboration of John Houghton and Georgina Murray), (1994) "The Politics of Business in Australia: The Concentration of Company Directorship Holding Among the Top 250 Corporates" Australian Journal of Political Science, Vol 29, no.1. March, 1994, pp. 40-61. (Refereed) C1
• Alexander, Malcolm and Georgina Murray, "Interlocking Directorships in the Top 250 Australian Companies: Comment on Carroll, Stening and Stening", Company and Securities Law Journal, Vol.10, No. 6, December, 1992, pp.385-395. (Refereed) C1

Awards and Fellowships

Biography

Malcolm Alexander teaches in the cultural sociology major at Griffith University, Australia. He trained in world systems theory and comparative sociology at McGill University. He has worked for many years on comparative and global studies of corporate power and interlocking directorates. He researches on corporate power structures and corporate elite networks in Australia and has done comparative studies of these topics in Canada, the US and Europe. In 2000-2001 he spent a year at the Netherlands Institute of Advanced Study with a multinational research group studying these topics. He has published articles on business networks and corporate research structures in Australian and international journals. His current interest is focused on understanding the structures of affiliation/ 2-mode networks. He is currently analyzing the 'small world' of Australian company directors and 'interlocks' between community organizations in Brisbane. He has edited two books and served as editor of major academic journals.