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The purpose of this paper is to explain and conceptually analyse the origins and outcomes of the Brazil‐USA cotton dispute.

The analysis is conducted using a conceptual framework to show the effects of US policies on Brazil and the world cotton market. The historical context of the conflict is presented, to explain the motivations of both countries and the background of the dispute.

US cotton subsidies and related policies have the effect of harming international producers, including Brazil. This analysis, along with an explanation of Brazil's role in world cotton production, explains why Brazil had cause to complain to the WTO and why the WTO ruled in its favor.

The implications of these rulings are that the international dispute and its unique resolution could foreshadow similar conflicts in the future between different parties over different commodities, and the analysis presented in this paper will serve to explain them.

This is the only paper to present a complete history of the Brazil‐USA conflict, along with a conceptual analysis of the targeted US policies.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a channel incentive program conceptual framework. In order to do so, a consolidated theoretical effort was completed together with observations from two countries – Brazil and the USA – to build evidence toward the proposed framework.

This paper first proposes a theoretical framework for understating marketing channel incentive programs, conceptualizing it as being composed by four dimensions being control, benefits, exclusiveness and formalization, mediated by power distribution between dealers and manufactures. Second, the developed framework was used for a cross-country analysis. Three multinational firms, global leaders in the crop protection industry, were selected in Brazil and the same three were selected in the USA. For completing each case report for the six companies in total, 16 people were interviewed, besides documental research over companies’ documents.

The framework helped describing and understanding the different group of incentives used per firm and country. Indeed, there are much more similarities within Brazil or the USA, than the same company in these two countries. The institutional environment and the network structure were fundamental to understand why the power center was different in these two countries that resulted in different channel incentive programs. In the USA, programs are very clear and straightforward in regard to a powerful dealer. If the dealer develops five or six output tasks, margins would increase considerably. In Brazil, however, dealers have a wider array of activities accompanying output measures. If they perform well they receive support, but fundamentally manufacturers strongly influence dealers’ daily management decisions.

The incentive programs analyzed are mostly based on the set of standard documents manufacturers produced for dealers and on interviews for clarifying the content of the documents. Therefore, manufacturers probably set some relationship aspects aside since “individual approaches” to dealers might exist that were not captured in this study. Another limitation is the application to one sole industry that may per se present particularities that could be inducted too far the conceptual model that was built.

The framework as suggested might first help to organize the thinking of first identifying the power distribution between manufacturer and dealers and understanding institutional and network underlying causes. The framework might then help to select the right performance measures, benefits while keeping exclusivity and formalization levels in mind. Several types of control measures and benefits are presented as examples that can be adapted to a particular situation. Special concerns should be considered when managing marketing channels with incentives in an emerging market, but mainly, one must recognize the need to identify resources limitations (financial, knowledge, or infrastructure). Second, institutions work quite inefficiently, which means that beyond legal enforcements, firms may rely heavily on additional coordination mechanisms such as incentives schemes and communication strategy to build a more social and bilateral control mechanism. Third, a manufacturer should recognize that even if they currently hold a less-dependent position to dealers, the dynamics of an emerging market may quickly change the dependence structure.

The paper brings together a literature review and consolidation over the topic of channel incentive programs, proposes a framework to be used by researchers or practioners and dive in three pairs of companies in different countries to analyze why management practice should be adjusted. Differences in developing and developed countries are highlighted and the impact on channel incentives.

There is an increased research interest in the recent phenomenon of Chinese small and medium‐sized businesses (SMEs) going abroad. The paper aims to enrich the literature by proposing a “Flying High, Landing Soft” curriculum helping Chinese SMEs going abroad. This innovative entrepreneurial curriculum is based on the Soft Landings program originally developed by the National Business Incubation Association. The objective of the curriculum is to provide a platform for students at various levels (undergraduate, graduate, and executive education) and business communities to engage in China‐USA‐Brazil entrepreneurship.

The “Flying High, Landing Soft” curriculum, consisting of three core elements (resources and networks; five steps process of coaching; cultivating storytellers), is grounded in the theories of input‐process‐output model of strategic entrepreneurship and docility‐based distributed cognition.

A “Flying High, Landing Soft” curriculum was developed to help the Chinese SMEs to invest in USA and Brazil. The curriculum is designed to take advantage of resources from the participating entities with the impact of enriching our students' educational experience and enabling business communities to engage in global business opportunities. The “Flying High, Landing Soft” curriculum is a win‐win program for everyone involved.

The curriculum is based on the Soft Landings International Incubator Designation program originally developed by the National Business Incubation Association. Since there is a need for the soft landings companies to go global, there is also a need for students to go global; the “Flying High, Landing Soft” curriculum is a merge of these two concepts.

The authors have developed a curriculum that links China‐USA‐Brazil entrepreneurs, investors, students and institutions to collaborate in order to help individuals to exploit market opportunities as well as use the process to educate students. This form of entrepreneurship curriculum is a contribution to our understanding about entrepreneurship, especially international entrepreneurship of SMEs.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the linkages among equity exchange traded funds (ETF) returns and transmission of volatilities of the USA, Europe and key emerging countries’ stock markets. Standard & Poor’s 500 (spy) and iShares Europe are used to represent the USA and European stock markets, the emerging market part of the data set consists of daily returns of equity ETF representing broad equity market indices of the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China); the mist countries (Mexico, Indonesia, South Korea and Turkey) and South Africa and covers the period of February 3, 2012-February 28, 2014.

The paper utilizes multi-variate auto-regressive moving-averages (MARMA) methodology to study equity market returns and spillovers. Second, generalized auto-regressive conditional heteroskadasticity (GARCH) modeling is employed to model volatility persistence and transmissions.

The findings include the existence of significant co-movement of returns among all country ETFs; however, despite increasing interdependencies among the global stock markets there are still very good opportunities for diversification. For example, USA and Europe based investors may do well to ignore opportunities in each other’s markets but can realize diversification benefits by investing in ETFs representing China, South Africa and Turkey. As far as volatilities are concerned, the findings indicate that no ETF volatility is transmitted from the sample countries to USA, Brazil, China and South African stock markets. Also, US market volatility is transmitted to India, Russia, Mexico and Turkey while European volatility spills over to Mexico and South Korea. The presence of spillovers among stock markets’ return series and persistence of volatilities are useful to investors interested in diversifying their portfolios and to traders/fund managers who are interested in maximizing returns.

The implications include: first, investors should not only rely on current domestic news to guide their investment decisions, but also take into consideration international news for there are substantial spillovers. Second, given that volatilities can proxy for risk, there are lessons for both individual and institutional investors in terms of further examining pricing securities, hedging and other trading strategies as well as framing regulatory policies. Third, investors should be able to ride the financial cycle by following closely monetary policies of the FED and European Central Bank and resulting credit expansion or contraction since research indicates (and as corroborated in this study) equity prices are linked to VIX which is also correlated with capital flows and credit expansion and interest rates. Limitations include: first, the investigation could be expanded to include individual countries in Europe instead of using one Europe-wide ETF. As ETFs for other emerging markets become available it is also possible to include additional countries. Second, ETFs may not be the best vehicles for diversification.

Methodology (MARMA and GARCH) is widely used for analyzing financial data. The use of BRIC and MIST countries and the interaction among them may be novel. Spillovers among emerging financial markets is a fairly new area. Typically, the authors see studies of spillovers from the developed countries to the developing ones. The data period is important since it covers both credit expansion and contraction (or the start of it) by the FED and is current.

The purpose of this paper is to identify and analyse the difficulties encountered in the implementation of a voice picking system at a large multinational company of the tractor industrial segment, outlining a comparison related to the main critical factors concerning the system implementation at a Brazilian and a USA plant.

The methodology utilised was qualitative and exploratory conducted through case studies in the two plants of the multinational company. The main data were collected through interviews with key managers directly involved in the project of voice picking system implementation.

The results indicate that the picking processes in the two plants were similar, since both were designed for the production line and conducted using bar-code readers and paper lists. Nevertheless, the internal warehousing process in the USA was more mature and computerised, whereas the Brazilian process still had opportunity for improvement, such as, the visual storage process, where the operator was responsible for locating an empty position.

Since this research is an exploratory case study, its results cannot be generalised.

The paper provides relevant practical information and experiences to managers interested in implementing voice picking systems, as well as interested in improving the accuracy and productivity of logistics processes within warehouses.

The voice picking systems are more widespread in the USA than in Brazil, and therefore, companies around the world can use this studied case to better understand about the voice picking systems implementation process in both emerging and mature marketplaces.

This study aims to examine the competitiveness of firms operating in the emerging economy of Brazil. This study examines the current perception of Brazilian business leaders regarding the level of competitiveness in various sectors of industrial activity and the country’s business environment.

Survey data were collected in a joint study developed by Brazilian School of Public and Business Administration (EBAPE) and the Brazilian Institute of Economics (IBRE). The population surveyed was composed of businessmen, managers and directors of Brazilian manufacturing firms. This survey was created based on a similar survey conducted by the Harvard Business School, which was also aimed at identifying the reasons behind national loss of competitiveness.

The results of the survey point out that the worsening competitive nature of companies operating in Brazil can be primarily attributed to the deterioration of its country-specific advantages and in particular those linked to government policies, services and bureaucratic procedures, all of which bear a negative impact on the country’s business environment.

Future research should explore in more depth the specific types of initiatives that these firms have and are continuing to eagerly adopt with the aim of improving their domestic competitiveness and, namely, firm-specific advantages, whether it be by contributing to the improvement of the business environment as a whole, or by improving their own operations and management systems.

The main obstacles related to competitiveness are associated with the “Brazil Cost”, namely, the tax system, infrastructure, political system, labor laws and bureaucracy that do not appear to offer much room for maneuvering in terms of reducing these barriers in the short term. Managers not addressing these important input factors of competitiveness not only divert attention away from innovation and creativity but also could lead to more serious political, social welfare and economic implications in the global marketplace.

This study helps to gain a better understanding of the initiatives that could and are being used to contribute to a fruitful discussion about leading public policies and government actions geared toward upgrading Brazil’s business environment and country competitiveness as a whole.

This research contributes to the understanding of the initiatives that could and are being used to improve firm competitiveness in Brazil. These initiatives contribute to a fruitful discussion about leading public policies and government actions geared toward upgrading Brazil’s business environment and country competitiveness as a whole.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the similarities and differences in the ethics and values seen within the USA, Brazil, Canada and the United Kingdom. By comparing these three countries to the USA, we can conclude the appropriate means in which to conduct business and research with any of the corresponding countries. This, in turn, will serve as a major asset to global business alike and prove to be monumental in the ways it breaks down cultural barriers to promote the sanctity of business worldwide.

The USA, Brazil, Canada and the United Kingdom were examined extensively on each of their ethics and values to fully grasp what the literature of previous empirical research stated. Throughout the literary research, data and surveys can be found to further emphasize the value and reliability of empirical research. Through the collaboration of thoughts and the literature that was discovered, we can draw conclusions about the similarities and differences between the USA, Brazil, Canada and the United Kingdom. It is clear that among the different countries ethics, values and cultural norms come into play when partaking in business.

There were many similarities and differences that lied between the different countries. Of those similarities, it was especially noticeable between the USA, Canada and the United Kingdom. This is due to the fact that these three countries have similar forms of common law governmental systems that are established and help form moral guidelines and parameters for doing business. Despite the fact that both the United Kingdom and Canada are under the rule of a Constitutional Monarchy, it is apparent that because the USA, United Kingdom and Canada have a free market economy all three operate at a similar capacity in terms of business.

This paper is original and provides value by taking a unique review of literature and reviewing previous research on the topic. Specific suggestions for future research are offered at the end of this paper.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the strategic decision-making process regarding communication flows and trust and their impact on firm cooperation in the context of buyer-supplier relationships in rule-based vs relation-based countries. An institutional view is explored to demonstrate how informal institutions shape a firm’s strategic decision making in the internationalization process.

A conceptual model and accompanying research hypotheses are tested on data from a survey of 169 US and 110 Brazilian buyers. Structural equation modeling is used to test the hypotheses.

Results suggest that the pattern of flows of communication on building trust and increasing strategic cooperation is based upon the governance of the individual’s country of origin. Quality communication is found to have a greater impact on trust in the USA, while two-way communication is the factor with the greatest effect on trust in Brazil. Frequency of communication and socialization are also found to have indirect, but important distinct roles in the flows of communication in both countries. Trust is also found to be a strong predictor of strategic cooperation.

Results provide insight into what patterns of communication flows are most influential in increasing a buyer’s trust in a supplier, so that suppliers can better formulate strategies to enter overseas markets.

This study extends the communication, trust, and cooperation literature to the context of buyer-supplier relationships in distinct county settings. Comparisons are made between one developed country characterized by rule-based governance, with a low-context style of communication and high country trust and one emerging market characterized by relation-based governance, with a high-context style of communication and low country trust.

This paper aims to explore the effects of institutional environments across developed and emerging markets on buyer–supplier cooperation. It empirically examines a Business-to-Business relational exchange model of trust-building, commitment and cooperative behaviors within firms in the USA and countries such as Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC).

A conceptual model and accompanying research hypotheses are tested on a sample of buyers from the USA (n = 169), Brazil (n = 110), China (n = 100), Russia (n = 100) and India (n = 100). Structural equation modeling is used to test the relationships in the model.

Findings suggest that approaches to achieve successful cooperation vary across countries and depend on the interaction between formal and informal institutions present in each country. Results show that buyers from India and China place relatively greater emphasis on conflict resolution and commitment, whereas buyers from Brazil and Russia rely more on trust in their efforts to create cooperative relationships. For US buyers, formality and quality of communication and functional benefits are key factors in fostering trust, commitment and cooperation.

A conceptual framework is advanced that extends traditional westernized and China-only perspectives of relational exchanges to a more universal context. Results suggest that suppliers understand how their buyers’ country-level institutional environment shapes their partnership legitimacy and relational motivations at the transaction level.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to examine buyer–supplier relational exchanges through the lenses of transaction cost, social exchange and institutional theories using the USA and BRIC nations as proxies for examination of institutional effects.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether macroeconomic crises are a motivational factor for earnings management practices by the companies listed in the capital markets of Brazil and the USA.

The sample consisted of 7,932 firm-quarter observations from listed Brazilian companies and 99,931 from listed US companies, covering a 13-year period (1998-2010). The authors developed regression models for the panel data, taking into account discretionary accruals as an earnings management proxy (dependent variable), while crises were regarded as a macroeconomic factor (dummy variable of interest). Also considered were return on assets, market-to-book ratio, size, leverage, foreign direct investment, income taxes, quarters, and sectors, which were treated as control variables.

The results corroborate the conceptual issues involved in undertaking this study, and they demonstrate that in periods of macroeconomic crises, companies are more motivated to employ earnings management practices both in Brazil and in the USA.

Unlike previous studies, the model developed in our research includes multiple macroeconomic crises simultaneously. Furthermore, it was applied in two markets at different stages of development and operating in distinct institutional contexts, which indicates its viability for replication for a large number of countries.