With the advent of cross-border electronic commerce, an increasing number of products that have been traded physically in the past are now imported digitally. This raises a number of issues, which are currently debated at the international level: should these products be defined as goods or services; which multilateral trade rules should govern them; and, should they remain tariff and tax exemp...

We present a theory of why some countries negotiate trade agreements during economic downturns. We argue that political leaders can gain from such agreements because of the signals they send to their publics. Publics are less likely to blame leaders for bad economic conditions when they have implemented sound economic policies, such as signing and implementing agreements designed to liberalize ...

This study aims to identify processes, current situations, and issues of recycling systems for four home appliances, namely, air conditioners, television receivers, refrigerators, and washing machines, among e-wastes in China and Japan for understanding and comparison of their characteristics. In accordance with results of a literature search, review of information disclosed online, and questio...

The development of new electronic markets is challenging, since many factors influence the market outcomes and hence the markets’ success. Even worse, a fundamental lesson learned from economics is that details matter: small changes in market design can have a significant impact on the market participant’s behaviors and thus on the achieved outcomes. Consequently a well structured process for d...

Electronic Services become more and more important for our daily life. News and communication services are among the most prominent examples that drastically transformed the way we keep ourselves informed and relate to each other. But new application areas for electronic services such as grid computing, security and surveillance, ambient assisted living, or intelligent facility management espec...

barter is a scalable, highly-available and efficient electronic commerce system that facilitates digital content trade over an open network. barter is designed to operate over a large-scale, global and heterogeneous communication network infrastructure. The barter protocols address two vital requirements from an electronic commerce system, neglected from existing systems: scalability and transa...

Latin America is facing a rapid increase in internet use along with fast growing computer sales. Penetration with electronic equipment is in some countries approaching the level of industrialized countries. There is an evident need to resolve the management of “end-of-life” computers and other electronic equipment. Several studies in Latin America assessed the increasing e-waste quantities and ...