Berle XVII

Berle XVII: International Business Transactions in a Fragmented World: National Security, Geopolitics, and Corporate Governance

March 21-22, 2025

In the spirit of Berle conversations, co-organizers Chuck O’Kelley and Kish Parella invited scholars from several fields — corporate law and international law, principally, but others as well. These two principal fields are rarely in direct conversation, but each offers important insights concerning the study and practice of international business.

We crafted Berle XVII to be an inter-disciplinary conversation to identify the various dimensions and challenges associated with the practice of international business today. Our aim was to complicate rather than clarify. As we hoped, what emerged is a messy but comprehensive picture of the various developments that do (or should) influence national foreign or economic policy, corporate business planning or both. For corporate scholars, the symposium volume offers insights on how economic policy and national security priorities shape the public policy choices of the US and other jurisdictions on trade, supply chain regulation, antitrust law and data, among other topics. For international law scholars, the symposium highlights businesses decision-making and the various factors that drive the compliance, transactional, and public policy choices of multinational companies.

Many topics were addressed in this symposium, including the following: How have national security concerns influenced domestic policy-making on foreign investment and trade? How are countries regulating supply chains and what are their policy objectives? How are business enterprises re-evaluating supply chain sourcing and organizational decisions? What are the preferred business models in new and emerging markets and what drives these choices? How are companies preparing for regional or global conflicts? How have cross-border contracts changed in response to heightened geopolitical risk around the world? How can the US and other countries support international business? How might the field on international business transactions be more richly theorized?

A goal of Berle XVII was to stimulate a reconceptualization of “International Business Transactions” as a field of study: What is “International Business Transactions”? We did not expect participants to directly address the nature of IBT in their papers (unless it furthered their passion and projects). Rather we expected a new conceptualization of IBT as a field of study might begin to emerge as a by-product of the cross-pollination of ideas and insights brought to the symposium and the conversations that follow.

Berle XVII: Day One

Friday, March 21, 2025

Berle XVII: Day Two

Saturday, March 22, 2025