Royal University of Phnom Penh

Institute of Foreign Languages

Department of International Studies
Course: IS401, Foreign Policy
Instructor: ASK
Class: M4.1 (C26)

Homework 03: Is Economic Sanction Effective?

Handed in by Group 09:

LIM MuyNgim
NGEL Sovannarith
PARK SoonJoo

October 24, 2014

Is economic sanction effective?

After the end of cold war, war is no longer a popular mechanism for settling the dispute
or dealing with international relation issues among states. Sanction, a substitute mean for war,
becomes one of the most crucial instrumentals in the world politics today and is the preferred
foreign policy of both the US and the EU who usually adopt it to deal with states that violate
international laws or the governments that treat their citizens unfairly. It is believed that
sanction is mostly imposed by the superpower or a strong state against a weaker state. The
effectiveness of sanction, particularly economic sanction, has been a controversial debate
among scholars around the world. Based on our groups perspective, we believe that economic
sanction is not very effective in pressuring or influencing other countrys behavior.
The successful rate of economics sanction is very low regardless of whether it is a
sanction imposed in accordance to UNSC resolution or a unilateral sanction. There was a study
claiming that the economic sanction has only 20% of success rate (Wallensteen, 2000).
Furthermore, there was another study stating that the success rate of economics sanction is onethird of the time (Linda, 2014). The first obvious and famous example of the ineffectiveness
of economic sanction would be the USs sanction on Cuba. It is such a long enduring sanctions
in world but it did not work at all. The sanction against Cuba began in 1960, which was one
year before Obama was born, but until now, the US still could not change Cuba behavior (The
economist, 2014). This is one of the most embarrassing foreign policies that the US failed in
the international stage.
Additionally, in Asia, North Korea would be a perfect example that can illustrate the
ineffectiveness of economic sanctions. The US and the UN have imposed economic sanctions
and later smart sanctions on North Korea for years, but those sanctions seem unbothered North
Koreas attitude toward their political issues. The sanctions posed by the West have not stopped
North Korea from developing Nuclear Weapon programs that could threaten the regional peace
of East Asia and the world as the whole because those sanctions mostly affect the citizens
rather than the leader or the elites.
Besides being unsuccessful in North America and East Asia, sanction is also failed to
reach favorable consequences in Africa. For instance, the UN adopted the UNSC resolution in
order to put sanctions such as arm embargo, travel ban, and billions of governments asset
freeze as well as other forms of economic sanctions against Libyas government after the
government cracked down on protestors (Lynch, 2011). Nonetheless, that sanction failed to
overthrow the Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi from his office until NATOs military

operation, which clearly shows that economics sanctions from the US and the UN are in
effective.
Another recent example of how powerless economic sanction is that the USs sanctions
on Russia. The sanctions have been imposed on Russia after Russia violated international laws
by annexing Crimea in February 2014. The US postponed military ties and halted trade talks
with Russia, while the EU restricted Russians visas and their assets (Krainova, 2014).
However, Russia has shown no fear of those sanction and they responded to the EU and the
US by planning to seize all foreign assets in Russia territory and freeze international inspections
of its nuclear weapons. According to Reuter, President Vladimir Putin labeled those sanctions
from the EU and the US as foolishness and those sanctions will not stop economic growth in
Russia (Korsunskaya, 2014). Unexpectedly, with the economic sanctions imposed by the US
and the EU, based on the median estimate of 38 economists surveyed by Bloomberg July 1823 and the forecast by the Russian government, Russias GDP may grow 0.5% this year, falling
from 1.3% in 2013, and it is projected to have 1.6% growth in 2015 (Adomanis, 2014;
Kolyandr, Ostroukh & Albanese, 2014).
However, the proponents of sanctions would raise the case of Myanmar reform in late
2010 as the example that proves the effectiveness of sanctions. The US together with the EU
had used economic sanctions against Myanmar from 1990 until 2012 based on the lack of
democracy and human rights violation by military junta toward the citizens of Myanmar. The
political and economic reform in Myanmar is regarded as a result of the sanctions from the
West. Nevertheless, some scholars argued that ASEANs roles were crucial for the Myanmars
transformation, even though ASEAN Way does not allow any ASEAN nation to interfere other
ASEAN countries international affairs. Rather than isolating Myanmar that could gave more
opportunities for China to strengthen their relationship, ASEAN has adopted constructive
engagement by engaging Myanmar in a dialogue of democratic reform and has also tried to
create positive incentives with a view to consolidate Burmas reform process, such as the
chairmanship in 2014 as leverage in their call for further reforms (Spandler, 2012).
In conclusion, economic sanction alone is not very effective in the contemporary world
politics because the chance of success is quite low, especially when it is imposed against strong
states. Although it is not so effective in most of the situations, the US and the EU prefer
sanction as the foreign policy instrument against those aggressive states that violate
international laws and that could pose threats to international peace and security because this
mechanism is the tool that could pressurize one state to shift her behavior.

References
Adomanis M. (2014, August 12). Despite US and EU sanctions, Russia's economy is still
growing. Forbes. Retrieved October 20, 2014 from
http://www.forbes.com/sites/markadomanis/2014/08/12/despite-us-and-eu-sanctionsrussias-economy-is-still-growing/
Kolyandr A., Ostroukh A., & Albanese C. (2014, October 22). russias economy stalls amid
Western sanctions, oil price drop. The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved October 23,
2014 from http://online.wsj.com/articles/russias-economy-stops-growing-inseptember-on-sanctions-uncertainty-1413968014
Korsunskaya, D. (2014, October 2). Putin says 'foolish' sanctions will not hold back Russia.
Reuters) [Moscow]. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/02/usrussia-putin-idUSKCN0HR0XU20141002
Krainova, N. (2014, March 6). Russia Preparing Response to U.S. and EU Sanctions. The
Moscow Times. Retrieved from http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/russiapreparing-response-to-us-and-eu-sanctions/495665.html
Linda, Y. (2014, March 21). The impact of economic sanctions on Russia. BBC. Retrieved
from http://www.bbc.com/news/business-26680182
Lynch, C. (2011, February 26). U.N. votes to impose sanction on Gaddafi. The Washington
post. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2011/02/26/AR2011022603386.html
Spandler K. (2012, May 28). Burmas Transformation? Give ASEAN Some Credit. IFAIR.
Retrieved October 20, 2014 from http://ifair.eu/en/think/burmas-transformation-giveasean-some-credit/
The Cuban embargo: if not now, when? (2014, April). The economist. Retrieved from
http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21600117-would-be-especially-good-timechange-americas-relations-cuba-if-not-now
Wallensteen, P. (2000). A Century of Economic Sanctions: A Field Revisited. Uppsala Peace
Research Papers, 1, 5. Retrieved from
http://www.uu.se/digitalAssets/18/18601_UPRP_No_1.pdf