BEIJING: Sanctions are increasingly employed by the U.S. to promote the full range of its foreign policy objectives. Yet all too often they turn out to be little more than expressions of U.S. displeasure or disapproval, proving to be blunt instruments that are unlikely to achieve desired results, and may even produce unintended and counterproductive consequences.
US President Joe Biden’s use of sanctions as part of foreign policy has brought the international nuclear deal with Iran to almost an end, and the U.S. imposed more new sanctions on Iran at the beginning of 2023.
The use of sanctions as a deterrent weapon raises an important question: Are they capable of actually changing the behavior of states, or are there other factors that affect their effectiveness? Sanctions are defined as mostly economic but also political and military penalties introduced to alter another country’s political or military behavior to accomplish foreign policy ends. As manifested by history, sanctions, either comprehensive or selective, may take the form of commercial and financial policies that typically ban customary trade and financial relations, block the sanctioned country’s ports, and reduce or remove diplomatic ties. They also include withdrawal of diplomatic relations, visa denials, negative votes in international financial institutions, foreign assistance reductions and cut-offs, export and import limitations, asset freezes, tariff increases, revocation of most favored nation trade status, cancellation of air links, as well as prohibitions on credit, financing and investment.
–The Daily Mail-Beijing review news exchange item
