Chapter 07 – The International Legal Environment: Playing by the Rules
Discussion Questions
1. Define:
Common Law Code Law
2. How does the international marketer determine what legal system will have jurisdiction when legal
disputes arise? Since there is no judicial body to deal with legal problems arising between citizens of
different countries, the foreign marketer must look to the legal systems of all the countries involved;
3. Discuss the state of international commercial law.
4. What is the “objective theory of jurisdiction?” How does it apply to a firm doing business within a
foreign country?
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authorized for sale or distribution in any manner. This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated,
forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Chapter 07 – The International Legal Environment: Playing by the Rules
5. Discuss some of the reasons why it is probably best to seek an out-of-court settlement in international
commercial legal disputes rather than sue.
6. Illustrate the procedure generally followed in international commercial disputes when settled under
the auspices of a formal arbitration tribunal.
What are intellectual property rights? Why should a company in international marketing take special
steps to protect them?
7. In many code law countries, ownership of intellectual property rights is established by registration
rather than prior use. Comment.
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© 2016 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not
authorized for sale or distribution in any manner. This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated,
forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Chapter 07 – The International Legal Environment: Playing by the Rules
8. Discuss the advantages to the international marketer arising from the existence of the various
international conventions on trademarks, patents, and copyrights.
9. “The legal environment of the foreign marketer takes on an added dimension of importance since
there is no single uniform international commercial law which governs foreign business transactions.”
Comment.
10. Why is conciliation a better way to resolve a commercial dispute than arbitration?
11. Differentiate between conciliation and arbitration.
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© 2016 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not
authorized for sale or distribution in any manner. This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated,
forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Chapter 07 – The International Legal Environment: Playing by the Rules
14. Assume you are a vice-president in charge of a new business-to-business e-commerce division of a
well-known major international auto parts manufacturer. A) A cyber squatter has registered the
company name as a domain Web name. What are your options to secure the domain name for your
company? B) Discuss the steps you should take to ensure worldwide protection of your domain name.
Existing law is vague or does not exist for such issues as the protection of domain names, taxes,
jurisdiction in cross-border transactions and contractual issues. Countries are beginning to draft
legislation to deal with myriad legal questions not clearly addressed by current law.
1 John Musgreave and Graham Porter, “Domain Name Pirates Whip Up Web Havoc,” The London Free Press, May 22, 2000.
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© 2016 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not
authorized for sale or distribution in any manner. This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated,
forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Chapter 07 – The International Legal Environment: Playing by the Rules
15. Discuss the issues of a website being sued for libel for information posted on the site.
The United States has taken a giant step in dealing with domain name pirates by passing the Anti-
cybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA) and the World Intellectual Property Organization
(WIPO) established a structure through the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
16. Discuss the motives of a cybersquatter. What resources does a company have to defend itself against
a cybersquatters.
Unfortunately, the ease with which Web names can be registered and the low cost of registering has
led to thousands being registered. Cybersquatters (CSQ) buy and register descriptive nouns,
geographic names, ethnic groups, pharmaceutical substances and other similar descriptors and hold
them until they can be sold at an inflated price. For example, a cybersquatter sold
http://www.themortgage.com / for $500,000; the record price paid so far is $7.5 million for the domain
name http://www.business.com /. If a cybersquatter has registered a generic domain name that a
company wants, the only recourse is to buy it.
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© 2016 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not
authorized for sale or distribution in any manner. This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated,
forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Chapter 07 – The International Legal Environment: Playing by the Rules
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© 2016 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not
authorized for sale or distribution in any manner. This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated,
forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.