U.S. Export Control: Background & Issues

The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) is a part of the U.S. Department of Commerce. The Export Enforcement arm of BIS protects U.S. national security, foreign policy, and economic interests by educating parties to export transactions on how to improve export compliance practices, interdicting illegal exports, investigating violations, and prosecuting violators of export control laws. At the same time, Export Enforcement works to avoid impeding legitimate trade. Export Enforcement has federal law enforcement authority and its special agents work with BIS licensing officials and policy staff to deter the export of items which, in the hands of unreliable users, can prove damaging to U.S. national security and foreign policy interests. This book provides an overview of the regulations of the BIS on export control. Based on the GAO’s extensive body of work on the export control system, this book also focuses on export licensing inefficiencies, poor interagency co-ordination and limits in State’s and Commerce’s ability to provide a sound basis for changes to the system. A number of recommendations to address these problems are included as well. This book consists of public documents which have been located, gathered, combined, reformatted, and enhanced with a subject index, selectively edited and bound to provide easy access.