And while the global marketplace can protect the target country from the economic impact of sanctions, it cannot protect U.S. businesses from the loss of commerce or U.S. workers from the resulting loss of jobs. Second, unilateral sanctions rarely achieve their objectives. In the five cases analyzed, unilateral U.S. sanctions failed to achieve any significant progress toward their human rights and democratization objectives. As the author points out, these sanctions are intended to change the oppressive behavior of authoritarian regimes that rely on oppression to maintain control and therefore actively resist the objectives we set out. Unilateral sanctions can play only a very small role in accomplishing national security objectives, such as containing weapons programs or preventing proliferation.
Multilateral efforts are far more effective in achieving their goals.
Third, at no point in the sanctions decision-making process is there a comprehensive assessment of the impact sanctions will have, either on the target country or on U.S. interests. One of the most alarming aspects of U.S. sanctions policy is the weak information base on which most sanctions decisions are made. Several dozen laws authorize the president to impose sanctions, but virtually none requires the president to assess the foreign policy, humanitarian, or domestic economic impact of a proposed sanction. This study offers a detailed analysis of the Sanctions Policy Reform Act, which I introduced in 1997, along with Senator Richard Lugar and Representative Phil Crane. The initiative is intended to provide Congress, the executive branch, and the public with better information about proposed economic sanctions and to establish guidelines for future sanctions proposals and procedures for their implementation.