Chapter 5
Legal Environment
Chapter Outline
Multiplicity
of Legal Environments
Legal Systems
Jurisdiction and Extraterritoriality
Legal Form of Organization
Branch vs. Subsidiary
Litigation vs. Arbitration
Chapter Outline
Bribery
- Legal Dimension
- Ethical Dimension
Intellectual Property
- Categories of Intellectual Property
- Legal Rights and Requirements
Legal Systems
Common
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Relying on precedents and conventions
E.g., USA, UK, Canada, India
Statute
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law system
law system
Code or civil law system
Main rules of law embodied in legislative codes
Japan and most continental European countries
Jurisdiction
territorial
range of authority
a court's legal power to hear a case
Extraterritoriality
a
country's or court's application of national
laws beyond its border
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E.g., USA and Foreign Corrupt Practices Act
E.g., Belgium’s universal jurisdiction
How to Settle Commercial Disputes
Negotiation
Arbitration
Litigation
Bribery: Legal Dimension
Foreign
Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA)
OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of
Foreign Public Officials in International
Business Transactions
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act
(FCPA)
Bribery is "the use of interstate commerce to offer, pay,
promise to pay, or authorize giving anything of value to
influence an act or decision by a foreign government,
politician, or political party to assist in obtaining,
retaining, or directing business to any person."
Types of Payment
- Permissible: expediting payments to low-level officials
who exercise only "ministerial" or "clerical" functions
- Illegal: payments to an official exercising discretionary
authority
Bribery: Ethical Dimension
Morality
as a function of culture
Corporate strategies
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Codes of conduct
Sensitization of ethics in managers through training
and education
Ethics audit
Transparency International
Corruption
Perceptions Index (CPI)
Bribe Payers Index (BPI)
Intellectual Property
"creations of the mind: inventions, literary and artistic
works, and symbols, names, images, and designs used
in commerce"
Trademark
Copyright
Patent
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Functional patent
Design patent
Trade Secret
Intellectual Property
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Trademark
symbol, word, or thing used to identify a product made or
marketed by a particular firm
Copyright
protection given to an author or artist for literary, musical,
dramatic, and artistic works
Patent
invention of a scientific or technical nature
Trade secret
know-how that is kept secret within a particular business
e.g., manufacturing methods, formulas, plans