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6.1: Introduction

  • Page ID
    42020
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    According to the Small Business Association, 96 percent of the world’s customers live outside of the United States. The international market is lucrative but the international legal environment is different from the US legal environment. Therefore, it is important to be familiar with the basic concepts of doing business in the global economy.

    Any business that operates across a national border is an International Business Entity (IBE). IBEs may be large, such as Samsung, or they may be small, such a souvenir stand that sells products across the border at Niagara Falls. When an IBE conducts business in another nation, it must comply with applicable laws in its nation of origin, in all nations where it does business, and applicable international laws. For example, if the Molson Coors Brewing Company, which is headquartered in Colorado, wants to sell its products in Mexico, it would need to comply with all applicable US, Mexican, and international laws, such as the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). This includes local and state laws within both the US and Mexico.

    US Laws Foreign Laws International Laws
    • Federal laws (including import & export regulations)
    • State laws
    • Local laws (including city & county regulations)
    • National laws (including import & export regulations)
    • State or province law
    • Local laws (including city & county regulations)
    • Bilateral treaties
    • Multilateral treaties (e.g. GATT)
    • UN Conventions (e.g. CISG)
    • Regional trade blocs (e.g. USMCA, EU, ASEAN)
    Counselor’s Corner

    US nationals and businesses need to understand that they are subject to the laws of the nations where they travel and operate. For example, many US nationals do not understand that they are restricted in what they can say and publish within China. The US Constitution’s freedom of speech does not apply when visiting or working in other nations, especially communist ones. It is worth the time to understand the culture of the nation a business wants to work in before investing too much time and resources into developing operations there. Culture is just as important as finances when developing a business plan to expand into another nation. If the culture is not one that the business is comfortable with, then it should look at business opportunities elsewhere. ~Wei Z., attorney


    This page titled 6.1: Introduction is shared under a CC BY 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Melissa Randall and Community College of Denver Students via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform.