When one nation imposes sanctions on another, it often does so because it has few other policy options. As the pressure becomes more intense, the government of the sanctioning nation feels an acute need to respond. The sanctioning government may also feel pressure from the international community to punish the target nation, to uphold international norms, to demonstrate solidarity with allied nations or with internal opposition in the target nation, or to deter worse behavior by demonstrating the will to escalate to a stronger response. The sanctioning nation wants to take an action stronger than a diplomatic response, but less drastic than covert action or military intervention.
Nations have limited ways of influencing the behavior of other nations.
Because sanctions occupy the middle ground between diplomatic and paramilitary or military action, they are often selected as the means to put pressure on a target nation. Since sanctions have both instrumental and symbolic goals, it is not easy to analyze the effectiveness of any particular action. For example, it is commonly supposed that the grain embargo that President Jimmy Carter imposed against the Soviet Union after it invaded Afghanistan was a failure-after all, the Soviets had not withdrawn their forces by the time Ronald Reagan lifted the embargo. In addition, many analysts point out that the sanctions had very little economic effect because the Soviet Union was able to replace U.S. grain with that of its competitors. But this perception of failure derives from the belief that compliance with the instrumental goal is the sole criterion for success.