Local responses to global challenges: Lessons from small economies

As part of a cooperative effort between the Journal of Business Research (JBR) and the Business Association of Latin American Studies (BALAS), this special issue brings updated research on the Latin American business environment and contributes to filling out the relative scarcity of academic works addressing managerial issues in this region. These papers represent the very best of the 53 papers presented at BALAS 2014 Conference held in Trinidad and Tobago. Only 20 were pre-selected to be double-blind reviewed for publication in this special issue — and of those, only seven were finally accepted after three further post-conference rounds of review. This introduction to the special issue of JBR on BALAS 2014 Conference briefly reviews the positive and negative consequences of international trade and investment, as well as the implications for countries/governments, communities, and local companies, and how each of these groups might handle the challenges of globalization positively.