Formation of a Sustainable Mechanism of Preferential VAT Taxation of Exports as Evidenced by the Russian Federation Practice

In this article we review the issues of applying a preferential value added tax (VAT) taxation regime on export transactions involving unlawful tax benefit claims and tax evasion. The main objective of this study is to supplement the theoretical and methodological foundations of transforming the system of indirect taxation of exports in the Russian Federation based on the analysis of legal precedents. We analyzed the foreign trade statistics for the Russian Federation and the volumes of export VAT; we also studied the court rulings in VAT-related tax disputes. Based on our analysis of the court cases, we discovered the main schemes of unlawful application of VAT preferences, such as “false exports”, introduction of additional layers of intermediaries, and use of agency services by exporting sellers. In addition, we formulated two problematic scenarios where bona fide transactions fall under the definition of such schemes. Specifically, these two scenarios include services contracts by foreign service providers that are reclassified by the tax authorities with an aim to challenge the offsetting of incoming VAT amounts and the specifics of applying VAT to transactions involving compensation-free transfer of goods to foreign legal entities. To minimize the number of tax disputes, we suggest that certain provisions of the Russian legislation are amended with more detail. The proposed innovations can positively affect international trade as they bring more easily understandable and stable conditions for the development of businesses engaged in cross-border service provisioning. At the same time, a reduction in the number of disputes based on the tax authorities’ subjective opinion of taxpayers’ activities would allow the tax authorities to concentrate on clearer and more objective criteria of tax compliance by Russian companies, thus simplifying tax administration in one of the domains of tax law.

William Herle and the English Secret Service

<p>This thesis examines William Herle's life through his surviving letters to William Cecil, Lord Burghley, and other Elizabethan Privy Councillors. It emphasises the centrality of the Elizabethan patronage system to Herle's life, describing how his ties to Cecil helped Herle escape prison, avoid his creditors, and gain recompense for his service to Elizabeth. In exchange for Cecil's protection, Herle became deeply involved in Elizabethan intelligence networks, both domestic and foreign, throughout the 1570s and 1580s. Herle helped uncover plots against Elizabeth, passed vital information about events in the Spanish Netherlands back to England, and provided analyses of English foreign policy for his superiors. Despite his vital role, Herle never experienced true success, and died deeply in debt and abandoned by his patrons. Herle's life allows us wider insights into Elizabethan government and society. His experiences emphasises the inefficient nature of the Tudor foreign service, which utilised untrained diplomats who gained their position through political connections and were left to pay their own way through taking out loans they had little hope of repaying. Similarly, the numerous law suits which Herle describes in his letters are absent from official records, implying that Tudor society was even more litigious than previously assumed. Herle's life-long status as a gentleman, despite being arrested as a pirate and frequently imprisoned for debt, reinforces the lack of social mobility in Elizabethan England. His focus throughout his life on the need to support the 'Protestant Cause,' and his fear of an international Catholic conspiracy was shared by Cecil, Leicester, and Walsingham, and shows how deeply religious divisions affected English foreign and domestic policy.</p>

William Herle and the English Secret Service

<p>This thesis examines William Herle's life through his surviving letters to William Cecil, Lord Burghley, and other Elizabethan Privy Councillors. It emphasises the centrality of the Elizabethan patronage system to Herle's life, describing how his ties to Cecil helped Herle escape prison, avoid his creditors, and gain recompense for his service to Elizabeth. In exchange for Cecil's protection, Herle became deeply involved in Elizabethan intelligence networks, both domestic and foreign, throughout the 1570s and 1580s. Herle helped uncover plots against Elizabeth, passed vital information about events in the Spanish Netherlands back to England, and provided analyses of English foreign policy for his superiors. Despite his vital role, Herle never experienced true success, and died deeply in debt and abandoned by his patrons. Herle's life allows us wider insights into Elizabethan government and society. His experiences emphasises the inefficient nature of the Tudor foreign service, which utilised untrained diplomats who gained their position through political connections and were left to pay their own way through taking out loans they had little hope of repaying. Similarly, the numerous law suits which Herle describes in his letters are absent from official records, implying that Tudor society was even more litigious than previously assumed. Herle's life-long status as a gentleman, despite being arrested as a pirate and frequently imprisoned for debt, reinforces the lack of social mobility in Elizabethan England. His focus throughout his life on the need to support the 'Protestant Cause,' and his fear of an international Catholic conspiracy was shared by Cecil, Leicester, and Walsingham, and shows how deeply religious divisions affected English foreign and domestic policy.</p>

Protecting Filipino migrant workers in distress through social media platforms

This exploratory study focuses on the Philippine government’s response to overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in distress, especially in the Middle East using social media platforms. It examines the level of social media adoption by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) in protecting Filipino nationals abroad. The popularity of social networking sites among Filipinos, including DFA officials and staff, played a vital role in influencing the institution’s move toward social media adoption. Key informant interviews were conducted with 10 officials, case officers, and staff at the DFA home office and Foreign Service Posts in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) from June to July 2019. While Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter can be effective tools for speedy communication between the DFA and OFWs, the DFA faces several challenges such as budgetary constraints, lack of human resources with ICT skills, and verifying reports, among others. The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the indispensable role of social media platforms in communicating with OFWs and in extending assistance to those in distress. Hence, the DFA may consider the formulation of an agency-wide social media strategy and collaboration with other migration authorities on social media-anchored projects.

Expatriate adjustment over time among foreign service employees: the role of cross-cultural experience

PurposeDrawing on social learning theory (SLT), this study aims to investigate how previous cross-cultural work experience influences individual adjustment in a foreign environment over time. For this purpose, the authors study foreign service employees who are characterized by permanent high mobility and frequent rotations.Design/methodology/approachTwo cross-sectional surveys conducted in 2011 (analytical sample N = 1,097) and 2019 (analytical sample N = 1,431) amongst German Foreign Service (GFS) employees are used to analyse employees' adjustment, measured by self-perceived quality of life (QOL) and its development over time based on four time points. Locational adjustment trajectories serve as robustness checks.FindingsYounger and therefore less experienced employees fit J-shaped patterns of adjustment, while more experienced employees show rather flat adjustment curves. Accordingly, work experience matters and “one curve fits all” approaches do not suffice to explain adjustment over time. Moreover, neither more nor less experienced employees experienced U-trajectories as proposed by previous literature on business expatriates.Research limitations/implicationsThe study findings are based on cross-sectional surveys, but longitudinal designs should be preferred in future research.Practical implicationsSending institutions may develop special support systems for inexperienced expatriates prior to departure to weaken the negative impacts of culture shock.Originality/valueExisting literature only sparsely analysed adjustment and QOL for foreign service employees/diplomats so far. To the authors’ knowledge, no study analysed trajectories of adjustment over time for this population. This study profits from the analysis across two surveys. Both samples benefit from a high diversity, among others, regarding gender, age, education and host countries.

Diplomats, Activists, and the Hauntology of American Empire in Martial Law Taiwan

Despite open US support for the Kuomintang (kmt) during the martial law period, opposition and pro-independence politics to this day have been haunted by the spectre of the American empire. Imaginings of US power and intentions, however, have often exceeded the actual institutional traces of US presence, both extending and subverting US power. In this article, I explore how imperial conditions during martial law were imagined through the relationships Taiwan dissidents had with two kinds of US expatriates: foreign service officers and civilian anti-kmt activists. While the former were formally bound to the principle of ‘non-interference’ despite local appeals, the latter justified ‘intervention’ as resistance against existing US support of the kmt. Based on a close reading of memoirs and historical surveys by former diplomats and activists, I examine how the micro-politics of the Cold War US presence contributed to spectres of American empire beyond the intentions of its putative planners.