Case de manabu Kokusai-Kigyo-Homu no essence (The Essence of International Corporate Practice – Learning with case studies)

A company is an organization that does business with the aim of expanding its value and maximizing returns through sustainable growth. However, its activities must be legally recognized and ethically appropriate. Corporate legal practice is a series of activities that identify, explore, solve, and prevent various legal and ethical issues related to such corporate activities, and are an important element of corporate management.
 
In today's global society, companies are seamlessly expanding their businesses for optimal results and establishing footholds across multiple countries. In these countries, various international transactions which differ in their characteristics from domestic transactions are carried out daily. Further, the legal and ethical challenges encountered by companies, which are the objectives of corporate legal practice, are extremely diverse and complex. Therefore, the international corporate legal practice cannot be easily grasped in its entirety, which means that optimal solution cannot be obtained only by the compartmentalized research of each of the domestic or foreign laws, the conventions, and the precedents and so on. In order to reach a goal, one should parallelly consider all the individual legal issues involved in the problem wherein it may be difficult to understand where to start, the nature and scope of, and to what extent special expertise must be acquired.
 
The content does not fit into the frame of the vertical subject division of conventional law, although it is the international trade law and the international business law that deal with such problems. This book also illustrates typical examples of various international matters that companies actually encounter, without following the traditional content and framework used for the bar exam subjects of international relations (private) law or in conventional textbooks. The study of a wide range of hypothetical cases provides a bird’s-eye view and understanding of how the people involved in international corporate practice would approach the problem as well as their thought processes. I as well as my co-authors tried to cover the problems that would normally be experienced in cross-border businesses, as well as the essence of the minimum knowledge one must have, as much as the scope of the paper allowed.
 
In the introduction, four co-authors with different attributes described the world of international corporate practice from their respective perspectives. Chapters 1 to 6 describe "Case," "Focus Point," "Point Commentary," and "Approach to and Solution of the Case" in each major area of international sale and purchase contracts, distributor and agency transactions, technical transactions, joint venture agreements, establishment and operation of overseas footholds, and project finance. The "Focus point" following the case shows what to consider while clarifying the whereabouts of and identifying issues, and the "Point Commentary" shows the issues and legal theories that should be considered specifically. Finally, “Approach to and Solution of the Case” shows how to respond to and resolve the problems of the case. One may read them in order, or when involved in international corporate practice. One may also read it whenever one needs its backing, or simply pinpoint and read the relevant portions.
 
However, the world of international business is progressing day by day, and the information in this book may become obsolete in no time. I would like to point out that this book is like a lighthouse that illuminates the darkness of international corporate practice, and that it is important for readers to expand their knowledge and update information by themselves.
 

(Written by HIRANO Haruo, Professor, Graduate Schools for Law and Politics / 2019)