Aulana Louise Peters

Born Aulana Louise Pharis in Shreveport Louisiana in 1941, the daughter of Clyde A. and Eula Mae (Faulkner) Pharis, Peters studied philosophy and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the College of New Rochelle (1963) and earned her Juris Doctor degree from the University of Southern California in 1973. Although not an accountant, Peters has had a profound and sustained influence on accounting and auditing scholarship, professional practice, professional standard setting, and corporate governance. She is a retired partner with Gibson, Dunn, and Crutcher LLP who focused on accountants’ liability and securities litigation. Her husband, Bruce, is a retired physician.

Among her distinctive service is her role as a Commissioner on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission from 1984-1988. She was the first African American and the third woman to serve on the Commission. In 2003, the Association of Securities and Exchange Commission Alumni named her the 11th recipient of the William O. Douglas Award for having made significant contributions to the development of the Federal Securities Law, to the SEC, and the financial community. In 2008, she received the Horatio Alger Award, which recognizes dedicated civic, corporate, and cultural leaders who succeeded despite adversity. In 2010, she was awarded the Medal of Honor by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) for distinguished service to the accounting profession by a non-accountant.

Peters’ ability to relate securities law to investors’ interests and the practicalities of accounting measurement and disclosure of risks made her a valuable contributor to the deliberations of the Financial Accounting Standards Board Financial Accounting Standards Advisory Council (1989-1992), the Steering Committee for the Financial Accounting Standards Financial Reporting Project (1990-1992), AICPA Board of Directors and Governing Council (1992-1994), Panel on Audit Effectiveness (1998-2000), Public Company Accounting Oversight Board of the AICPA (2000-2002), International Federation of Accountants’ Public Interest Oversight Board for Auditing, Education and Professional Ethics Standards (2005-2012), and United States Comptroller General’s Accountability Advisory Council (2001-2020).

Her service on public company boards of directors has included manufacturing, financial, and aerospace corporations. Because of her understanding of the audit profession and her demonstrated commitment to the public interest, Peters testified before Congress in the legislative hearings prior to the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. She subsequently served on the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s Advisory Council (2007-2013).

An early advocate of international accounting standards and for disclosure to investors of material information on Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) matters and for the establishment of standards to guide those disclosures, she served as a director of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board Foundation from 2013 to 2016.

Aulana Louise Peters is the 116th member of The Accounting Hall of Fame.