Business & Corporate Laws Govern Business and Commercial Transactions

By Ashley Conner

Business and corporate laws are also respectively known as commercial and company laws. Both forms of law govern business and commercial transactions as well as the internal rules of business firms. Business laws refer to the laws involving contracts, sales, commercial paper, agency, and employment law among many others. Corporate law, on the other hand, studies the relation between businesses and consumers under the internal rules of the firm. Both provide the bodies of law that govern all business and corporate transactions whether in private or public.

Business law refers to the laws which are applied to business entities such as partnerships and corporations. These are used as reference when putting up businesses whether big or small - from sole proprietorship to corporation. Business laws specify how different business can be set up, how taxes apply to them, registrations, documentations and requirements; define different terms pertaining to business, making by-laws, and articles of organization among many others. These also provide the regulatory schemes on how commerce should be conducted.

Business law is applied to all sectors of businesses such as automotive, estate planning, health, law, intellectual property, litigation, employment and labor, business restructuring and business & corporate. It governs all business and commercial transactions whether private or public. Business law also covers other business issues such as starting, selling or buying other businesses, managing the business, dealing with employees and contracts to name a few.

Corporate law, on the other hand, involve the same laws and processes under business laws but have 5 defining characteristics which include:

• separate legal personality of the corporation
• limited liability of the shareholders
• transferrable shares
• delegated management
• investor ownership

These are all applied largely for corporations which are publicly owned. Corporate law is applied to protect both company and shareholders' rights especially if the corporation fails or is involved in legal matters. Corporate law can be traced back to the middle ages when medieval guilds were formed but not for common profit. It was also during this time that different forms of businesses such as partnership were developed.

Corporate law covers corporate governance that includes the corporate constitution, balance of power, corporate personality, capacity and powers, director's duties, and corporate litigation. All of these are vital for the application of corporate laws. In addition, this also involves how shares, liquidations and dealings should be handled as well as in cases of corporate crimes, mergers, acquisitions and insolvency of the company.

Both business & corporate laws involve the details, rules and regulations involved in setting up businesses, choosing legal structures, recruiting & hiring, financing, paying of taxes, dealing with consumers and shareholders, solving issues, dealing with business and corporate crimes, and regulating all aspects involving commercial and corporation by-laws.

Ashley Conner is a writer for Zipcodez.com, a widely-used local business listings search portal. Zipcodez.com also features an efficient job, movie, and restaurant search covering over 100 major cities nationwide. Ashley has covered useful topics and resources from "Arts & Entertainment" to "Wireless & Telecommunications" for Zipcodez.com. You can easily find out what convenient and useful resources are in your neighborhood by visiting http://www.zipcodez.com.

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Tags: Business and Commercial

International Laws For Laser Weapons

By Frank Smith

The ground work for the current international laws for laser weapons was laid back 1949 Geneva Convention. The Six Day war in the Middle East and the Vietnam war in the Far East received a lot of media attention, bring home to the public the gruesome reality of warfare. After these two wars, the opinion in many countries and organizations such as International Committee of the Red Cross/Red Crescent (ICRC) was that the 1949 Geneva Convention were inadequate for modern warfare and needed revising.

The four-sessions of Diplomatic Conference on the Reaffirmation and Development of International Humanitarian Law Applicable in Armed Conflicts (Diplomatic Conference) were held between 1974 and 1977 to enactment two Additional Protocols (AP) to the 1949 Geneva Conventions. The two APs did not make any rules about specific weapons and mainly repeated customary prohibitions such as explosive ammunition and expanding dum dum bullets, which are capable of causing superfluous injury and unnecessary suffering to the victims.

During a 1979-1980 United Nations Summit in Geneva, a treaty and three protocols banning specific weapons was adopted. Later in 1995 a follow up review conference was held in Vienna. During this conference participants agreed to add a new Protocol on Blinding Laser Weapons to the Geneva Convention.

This new protocol, Protocol IV states "It is prohibited to employ laser weapons specifically designed, as their sole combat function or as one of their combat functions, to cause permanent blindness to unenhanced vision, that is to the naked eye or to the eye with corrective eyesight devices..."

In simple terms, lasers that are designed to blind people were made illegal by international law.

Despite this law, many countries are investing billions in the research and production of laser weapons. For example the US has awarded multimillion dollar contracts to defense contractors such as Boeing and Northrop Grumman for the development, testing and production of laser weapons.

The countries producing laser weapons are using a loop hole in Protocol IV by stating their weapons are not designed specifically to blind and are there for legal. Blinding some one is much easier than killing them or destroying vehicles and even the most advanced laser weapon has limited capability so the future effectiveness of international laws on laser weapons remains to be seen.

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Frank is a laser expert from Dragonlasers - No 1 online store for green laser pointers & high power lasers.

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Tags: International Laws