November/December (1) Evidence
Lincoln-Douglas Debate Evidence
For the Resolution
Resolved: The use of economic sanctions to achieve U.S. foreign policy goals is moral.
November/December 1999 NFL LD Topic
Editor and Researcher: Craig Linton
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President Woodrow Wilson, 1919
ECONOMIC SANCTIONS = NO NEED FOR FORCE
A nation that is boycotted is a nation that is in sight of surrender. Apply this economic, peaceful, silent, deadly remedy and there will be no need for force. It does not cost a life outside the nation boycotted, but it brings a pressure upon the nation which, in my judgment, no modern nation could resist.
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Kimberly Ann Elliott, Research Fellow for the Institute for International Economics. "Evidence on the Costs and Benefits of Economic Sanctions" (Speech) before the Subcommittee on trade of the House Committee on Ways and Means. October 23, 1997.
SANCTIONS OFFER LIMITED RESULTS
The reality, alas, has been far different from what President Wilson envisioned. The global, comprehensive, and vigorously enforced sanctions against Iraq and the former Yugoslavia have produced at best limited and tenuous results. Unilateral sanctions--even when imposed by the largest economy in the world--face far more difficult challenges, especially in an increasingly integrated international economy. Even against such small and vulnerable targets as Haiti and Panama, military force eventually was required to achieve American goals.
SANCTIONS HISTORICALLY DON'T WORK
Extensive empirical research on the effectiveness of economic sanctions throughout this century suggests that these two cases are not unusual. Since 1970, unilateral US sanctions have achieved foreign policy goals in only 13 percent of the cases where they have been imposed. In addition to whatever effect repeated failure may have on the credibility of US leadership, other recent research suggests that economic sanctions are costing the United States $15 billion to $19 billion annually in potential exports. This, in turn, translates into 200,000 or more jobs lost in the relatively highly compensated export sector.
DECLINING UTILITY OF U.S. SANCTIONS
A striking result of our analysis, however, is the declining utility of US economic sanctions as a foreign policy tool, especially when they are unilateral (see table 1). Prior to the 1970s, sanctions in which the United States was involved, either alone or with others, succeeded at least partially just over 50 percent of the time. Between 1970 and 1990, however, US sanctions succeeded in just 21 percent of the cases initiated.
U.S. NO LONGER AS DOMINANT IN ECONOMY
Many factors contribute to these results but a large part of the explanation must be the effects of globalization. The United States is no longer as dominant in the world economy as it once was and its leverage has declined concomitantly. Given that these trends have continued in the 1990s, or even accelerated, there is little reason to expect that the utility of unilateral sanctions has improved in recent years.
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Kenneth R. Himes, O.F.M., is professor of moral theology at the Washington Theological Union. During the 1996-97 academic year he holds the McKeever Chair of Moral Theology at Saint John's University, Jamaica, New York. "War by Other Means: Criteria For the Use of Economic Sanctions"
AMERICANS UNWILLING TO SUPPORT MILITARY ACTIVITY
The end of the cold war has presented American foreign policy with a paradoxical situation: As the remaining superpower, the United States can consider military intervention without great risk, yet in the absence of a clear threat to the nation most Americans are increasingly unwilling to support military intervention. Somalia, Haiti, and Bosnia, each in its own way, illustrates the general uneasiness most U.S. citizens feel about sending troops abroad.
DEFINITION OF ECONOMIC SANCTIONS
Economic sanctions are essentially efforts to influence a country's behavior by imposing economic penalties. They can take a variety of forms: imposing embargoes, barring financial transactions, freezing economic assets held abroad, and curtailing trade and foreign aid. Sanctions of one or other of these types have been imposed over the last several years on Cuba, Iraq, Serbia, Somalia, Libya, Haiti, and Cambodia, with mixed results, politically and morally.
TOO LITTLE THOUGHT INTO GOALS
Thus, a 1992 General Accounting Office study done for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee examining the goals, process, and impact of economic sanctions found that, while sanctions can serve a variety of purposes, too little thought is given to specific goals and the means of accomplishing them ("Economic Sanctions: Effectiveness as Tools for Foreign Policy," GAO Document Distribution Center, NSIAD-92-106). The GAO findings indicate that some goals are achievable (reaffirming international norms by punishment of violators or deterring potential violations by the threat of subsequent penalties), while others are not (bending the target nation's policies to suit the sanctioner's wishes).
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Stuart E. Eizenstat, Under Secretary of State for Economic, Business, and Agricultural Affairs Testimony Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Washington, DC, July 1, 1999
AMERICAN PEOPLE HAVE RIGHT TO EFFECTIVE SANCTIONS
Nevertheless, the American people do have a right to expect generally that when we use economic sanctions, the specific sanctions measures will have a significant impact on those targeted, that they can be effectively implemented and enforced, that they will not cause more collateral damage than the wrong they are trying to remedy, and that due consideration is given to the potential adverse impact on other U.S. interests.
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Warner Rose, USIA Staff Writer, "Economic Sanctions can be an Important 'Diplomatic Tool'", 3/27/98.
SANCTIONS IMPORTANT
"Economic sanctions can be -- at times -- an important, effective means, as part of a diplomatic tool kit, that can be used to try to alter behavior by states that are dangerous to our values and our interests," said Alan Larson, assistant secretary of state for economic and business affairs.
LARGE AMOUNT OF SANCTIONS
Members of Congress seeking restraints on the use of foreign policy economic sanctions cited the incredible growth in their use. While the United States has imposed sanctions for foreign policy purposes 100 times since the Second World War, more than 60 of these actions have been taken since 1993, said Congressman Lee Hamilton of Indiana, one of the sponsors of the "Sanctions Reform Act," speaking March 25 before the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee.
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By Richard N. Haass, Director of the Foreign Policy Studies program at Brookings and editor of the new book, Economic Sanctions and American Diplomacy. "Economic Sanctions: Too Much of a bad Thing".
SANCTIONS - DEFINITION
Sanctions--defined as mostly economic but also political and military penalties introduced to alter political and/or military behavior--are employed by the United States to discourage the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles, bolster human rights, end terrorism, thwart drug trafficking, discourage armed aggression, promote market access, protect the environment, and replace governments.
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JOEL ROSENTHAL, President, Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs - Commerce v. Conscience - May 7, 1997
AMERICAN SENSE OF MORALITY
We as Americans like to think of ourselves as "a moral nation." We often talk about our foreign policy in terms of what is moral, just and right. This preoccupation with morality is probably a result of our Anglo-Saxon and Calvinist heritage along with the accidents of our history and geography. Ever since John Winthrop preached his "City upon a Hill" sermon aboard the ship Arabella off the coast of Massachusetts in 1639, we have thought ourselves exceptional--here in a new promised land, a new Jerusalem, on an errand into the wilderness, seeking to create a new society, free from corruption of the old world.
And yet our history of the nation tells us that our concern with this moral dimension of our national purpose has cut two ways. At their best, our moral commitments have produced the freest and most prosperous nation ever; they have formed the basis for a constitutional government that has evolved with great success. At their worst, these moral commitments have a produced a crusading moralism that has proven dangerous if not corrosive in certain instances. Since the positive side of our moral principles is so easy to explain--support for human rights, democracy, the great victories of this century against fascism and communism--let me illustrate for just a moment the downside and the dangers.
TWO-FOLD PROBLEM WITH SANCTIONS
The problem with sanctions is two-fold. First do they work? And second, are they indeed the most humane and moral policy option available?
On the question of "do they work" the answer is, not surprisingly, "it depends." However, the data is less cheerful than one might expect. According to one study, sanctions achieve their stated goal only 34 percent of the time--a one in three average. And one of the conclusions of a recent report issued by the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict states that "sanctions regimes mandated since 1990 have lasted longer, produced less, and been far more costly and complex than their proponents anticipated."
MORAL CONCERNS OF SANCTIONS
Far from being more humane than other policies, there is much evidence that sanctions are often more harmful than conventionally thought. Most importantly, sanctions are frequently most harmful to the weakest, poorest, and most vulnerable in a targeted society--the women, children, elderly, sick, and the working poor.
SANCTIONS ARE A BLUNT INSTRUMENT
It is one of the great paradoxes of sanctions that while they are meant to be a humane alternative, by design, they are often a blunt instrument.
SANCTIONS STAND FOR VALUES
In my view--and we can debate this in the discussion session--I see the "ethics" of sanctions as follows. For punishment and for rhetorical purposes (to stand up for a value or principle and to make the point that something is unacceptable), I say "yes," sanctions can and should have a place in US foreign policy. For example, in the recent case of Myanmar, I think that the imposition of sanctions can be justified on the simple grounds of saying: on principle, we deplore the actions of this government, and we do not want to do business with these people. That said, I also think it would be a mistake to adopt this policy with the belief that it will actually change the government in Yangoon.
SANCTIONS CAN SHAME COUNTRIES
For the purpose of "shaming" the current government and perhaps influencing world opinion--as well as standing up for principle--I again say "yes," economic sanctions can play a constructive role. Sometimes it is desirable to act on principle for the sake of principle. But as I say, this deontological position--this stand on behalf of the ethics of duty--should be understood for what it is. It is a principled stand, not necessarily a recipe for efficient or effective policy.
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Jeffrey J. Schott, Senior Fellow, Institute for International Economics. "The Iran and Libya Sanctions Act of 1996: Results to Date" (Speech) before the House Committee on International Relations. July 23, 1997.
SUCCESS OF SANCTIONS IS RELATIVE
“Success” is in the eyes of the beholder, and policymakers and analysts evaluate recent developments based on different criteria. Even if one puts the impact of the US sanctions policy in the best light, however, it would be hard to call the results to date “successful”.
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