Abstract This study gathered and examined empirical evidence concerning the extent to which the performance of cooperatives is related to board composition and interaction patterns – more specifically board size, number of external directors, director tenure and attitudes, frequency of board meetings, education of directors, and degree of consensus between the board and the chief executive officer (CEO). Theories of corporate governance provided propositions that were used as a starting-point for interviews held with board chairmen in thirteen Swedish agricultural cooperatives. The results show that cooperatives benefit from larger boards than suggested by most governance literature. External directors do not improve the overall performance, but having well-educated directors and CEOs who recognize the specificities of cooperative governance are crucial.

中文翻译：

---

了解瑞典农民合作社的董事会-有关董事会组成和互动模式的案例

摘要这项研究收集并检验了有关合作社绩效在多大程度上与董事会组成和互动模式有关的经验证据，更具体地讲，董事会规模，外部董事人数，董事任期和态度，董事会会议频率，董事教育程度，董事会与首席执行官（CEO）之间的共识程度。公司治理理论提供了建议，这些建议被用作与十三家瑞典农业合作社董事会主席进行访谈的起点。结果表明，与大多数治理文献所建议的相比，合作社可从更大的董事会中受益。外部董事并不能改善整体绩效，