James Guthrie
Emeritus Prof. James Guthrie, AM, Department of Accounting & Corporate Governance, Macquarie University. Joint founding editor of Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal consistently ranked in the top 5. James has researched public sector issues and has 220 articles, 20 books and 45 chapters.
James's recent articles
3 September 2025
Reining in vice-chancellor and executive pay: Restoring governance in public universities
In recent years — especially since the COVID-19 pandemic — executive pay in Australian public universities has drawn increasing public and political scrutiny.
2 September 2025
Reining in the consultant culture in Australia’s public universities
The quiet rise of private consultancy in Australia’s public universities has now reached a point where it is reshaping the sector’s priorities, governance, and capacity to act in the public interest.
1 September 2025
Reforming university governance: Restoring accountability and the public mission
Over the past three decades, Australia’s public universities have experienced a profound shift in governance culture.
24 April 2025
Feeding the beast: The use of private consultants by public universities and its implications for tertiary education
Global consulting partnerships are not only reshaping public sector organisations along corporate lines and hollowing out government expertise in the process, but they have also been responsible for a significant decline in tertiary education quality and standards, including billions of dollars in wasteful expenditure on non-core business.
11 December 2022
Multinational tax integrity and tax avoidance by the fossil fuel industry: Part 2
This is the second instalment of a two-part series based on our recent submission to the Australian Government regarding tax transparency and the fossil fuel industry. The first part examined how transnational fossil fuel corporations are routinely engaged in accounting practices which enable them to avoid paying the Australian Government hundreds of billions of dollars in income tax. This second part provides recommendations for minimising these tax avoidance practices and recouping some of the wealth these corporations have extracted from Australia.
15 November 2022
Multinational tax integrity and tax avoidance by the fossil fuel industry: Part 1
This is the first instalment of a two-part series based on our recent submission to the Australian Government regarding tax transparency and the fossil fuel industry. The first part examines Australia's global fossil fuel transnational corporations' problems and tax practices. The second part provides recommendations for minimising their tax avoidance practices.
2 August 2022
James Guthrie and Adam Lucas: It's time for a Royal Commission into the governance of Australias public universities
What is the core purpose of a university? Is it to share knowledge and engage in research? Or is it to make money? Our analysis of university management rhetoric versus financial reality for Australian public sector universities finds that they have drifted far away from their core mission to become property development and financial investment vehicles.