How Independent Are Independent Directors?

Board independence is a pillar of good corporate governance. It ensures that a corporation's management is properly monitored and that the corporation's decisions effectively balance the various stakeholders' interests. Over the past decades, Canadian regulators (with support from investors) have required companies to increase the number of independent directors on their boards and have created stricter requirements for what qualifies as 'independent'. But are independent directors now truly independent?

In a US paper published by Kastiel and Nili, the authors argued that independent directors today, while technically independent, are functionally still very dependent on management. This is because of the directors' "informational capture" – lacking the time, adequate resources, and specific knowledge to properly obtain, digest, and analyze extensive and complex information that modern boards evaluate. This informational gap often causes independent directors to rely