Economic Sanctions Should Not Be Used To Achieve Foreign Policy Objectives

Thanks for accepting the challenge, Con. Before I begin, I"ll define a few key terms to ensure clarity. 1.Economic sanction- domestic penalties applied by one country (or group of countries) on another country (or group of countries). Economic sanctions may include various forms of trade barriers and restrictions on financial transactions. 2.Societal Welfare- doing what is best for society as a whole 3.Morality- conformity to ideals of right human conduct (Webster"s New Collegiate Dictionary) Economic sanctions should not be used to achieve foreign policy objectives. When we do not impose economic sanctions on other countries we are being moral because we must not coerce a nation to conform to our ideals simply because they deviate from our standards of conduct in certain areas. We must recognize other nation"s sovereignty and autonomy and only respond with physical force when directly attacked. Therefore, we must base our decisions (in order to achieve morality) on the criterion of societal welfare. When we have achieved societal welfare we have reached a state of morality because we have implemented the best possible option for members of a society. I will demonstrate how sanctions violate societal welfare in three ways: first that they are extremely unlikely to succeed, next that sanctions are a form of warfare targeted against innocent civilians and the poor, and finally that almost all past efforts involving sanctions have failed. I.Sanctions Are Unlikely To Succeed I would like to begin with a fairly lengthy quotation from Ivan Eland"s article "Sanctions: Useless or Worse than Useless?" "With some qualifications, economic sanctions usually fail, both economically and politically. Although bans on trade, investment, lending, travel, etc. can bite initially, smuggling and black markets are lucrative and, over time, become rampant. Over the long term, the best that can be accomplished is to raise the prices paid by the target nation for the things it wants. Because sanctions use economic coercion to try to achieve political ends, attenuation of the economic pain through adaptation lessens the chance that sanctions will produce the desired political outcome. The possibility of political success is further diminished by the oft grandiose goals of the sanctioning nations- for example, sanctions attempting to change the nature of an oppressive regime, such as those proposed against the government of Alexander Lukashenko in Belarus. Furthermore, although apartheid was eventually eliminated in South Africa, the mild international sanctions imposed on that country had less to do with its removal than did the internal social movement for the reform of a ghastly social anachronism." As is apparent from the examples presented in this article in countless others, economic sanctions are not only ineffective, but they also often create more problems than they solve. When our imposed sanctions negatively affect the population purposelessly we do not achieve societal welfare and are thereby also immoral. II.Sanctions Are A Form Of Warfare Targeted Against Civilians I begin with a quote from Robert M. Hayden"s article "Sanctions and Collective Guilt". "The catastrophic effects of sanctions should come as no surprise. While many writers seem to think of sanctions as an alternative to war, in international law a blockade has always been recognized as an act of war. Since the military, police and ruling political elites will always get the first and best access to whatever goods that still reach the targeted country, sanctions are a form of warfare aimed primarily at the civilian population and, among them at those least well connected to the political leadership." Again, the parties which any declaration of war is meant to include are not majorly involved. Sanctioning not only attacks the poor, but often affects most those who are most sympathetic to the idea of an overthrow of whatever corrupt leadership may be in place at the time. Causing such blatant damage to innocent members of a country"s populace clearly does not uphold societal welfare and is immoral. III.Economic Sanctions Generally Fail I begin my final contention with a quote from Robert P. Quinn"s "A User"s Guide to Economic Sanctions". "Historically, economic sanctions have a poor track record. Between 1914 and 1990, various countries imposed economic sanctions in 116 cases. They failed to achieve their stated objective in 66 percent of those cases and were at best only partially successful in most of the rest. Since 1973, the success ratio for economic sanctions has fallen precipitously to 24 percent for all cases." This evidence shows empirically that sanctions are typically completely unsuccessful and even the occasion success is only partial. To follow any system with such a poor track record of failure does not uphold societal welfare. You see, demanding that trade be ceased with a country might be acceptable if it achieved the greater good for the people, but instead it only hurts the businesses of the sanctioning country and the innocent in the sanctioned country.