<![CDATA[Earnings management, typically measured through discretionary accruals, is widely understood to degrade the quality of financial reporting, and corporate governance mechanisms are conventionally viewed as the primary internal constraint on such behavior. This article synthesizes recent Indonesian empirical evidence on whether, and through which specific mechanisms, corporate governance actually constrains earnings management and improves financial reporting quality in Indonesian public companies. Using a systematic thematic review of studies published between 2017 and 2026, the analysis finds that evidence on individual board-level mechanisms, board independence and audit committee activity, is sharply divided, with roughly half of the reviewed studies reporting a significant constraining effect and the remainder finding no significant relationship. By contrast, institutional ownership and composite governance indices show far more consistent negative associations with earnings management across studies. The review further finds that corporate governance operates not only as a direct constraint but also as a moderator and mediator linking earnings management, fair value measurement, IFRS adoption, and sustainability reporting to reporting quality outcomes, with weak governance shown to amplify the earnings-management risk introduced by measurement discretion and managerial ability. The synthesis concludes that governance's effectiveness in the Indonesian context is mechanism-specific rather than uniform, and that policy and firm-level reform should prioritize institutional ownership and composite governance quality over reliance on any single board-level structure.]]>
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