A Strategic Understanding of UN Economic Sanctions

Golnoosh Hakimdavar

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781136270598
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Treaties
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Economic Sanctions are increasingly used as a legal, non-military technique of combating abusers of international peace. However it remains unclear how the success or failure of these sanctions is measured. This book examines the seldom-explored United Nations' economic sanctions deliberation process and exposes systematic problems in the measurement of the success or failure of these sanctions. Centering on the key concepts of "peace and security, " the author brings the reader's attention to the discrepancies that exist in the process of decision-making, implementation, and evaluation of UN imposed economic sanctions. She engages international law and development methods to provide proof for the lack of consensus in measures of success and failure, which in turn suggests that sanction implementation on a uniform domestic front are unattainable. This thorough analysis concludes with suggestions for improving the sanctions process, only to clear the path for negating them as a whole and suggest alternative non-coercive measures for mitigating conflict situations and threats to peace and security.

1 Introduction

Not unlike the sorcerers of primitive ages, [great humanitarians] attempt to exorcise social evils by the indefatigable repetition of magic formulae. As the League of Nations was a failure, let us have another League. As the first and second Peace Conferences of the Hague did not succeed, let us have a third one. As arbitration never settled a political conflict which otherwise would have let to war, let us have more arbitration.

—Hans Morgenthau, Positivism, Functionalism & Int’l Law (1940)

Somewhere deep down, even the most dedicated human rights professional knows that what can seem urgent and noble is often also tawdry and voyeuristic. Our ethics seems impractical, sentimental, inauthentic. [. . .] Our pragmatism stains our piety.

—David Kennedy, The Rights of Spring (2009)

After a decade of sanctions that killed over one million Iraqis, the economic sanctions on Iraq came to a partial end on May 22, 2003, two months after a military attack on the country. The outrage that was left after the sanctions led to extensive inquiry into the use of sanctions as a coercive measure. The consensus reached was that the Iraqi sanctions were not effective and that there was need for a new, more advanced type of sanctions that would not harm the population. Thus, politicians and academics began to introduce a new magic formula, “targeted sanctions,” as a new method of dealing with threats to peace. This new form of sanctions targeted the ruling elite and minimized the effect on the general population.

Not long after the end of the Iraqi sanctions, targeted sanctions were imposed on Iran because of Iran’s alleged quest towards development of nuclear weapons. However, the disguise of targeted sanctions has slowly begun to smear away as sanctions on Iran have strengthened. In March 2008, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) imposed Resolution 1803 monitoring the activities of Iranian banks and adding restrictions on trade, an act which was the first step in moving sanctions back in the same direction as the comprehensive Iraqi sanctions. The idea of targeted sanctions is to sanction terrorists or the ruling elite by freezing their assets, travel, and sales of military equipment. As strength of this set of targeted sanctions has increased because of continuous threats to international peace, the sanctions have damaged the Iranian economy to the point that the population is devastated on all sides. United Nations (UN) sanctions imposed on Iran in 2010 were designed to minimize possible transactions that would go through Iranian banks and freeze the funds and assets of the Islamic Republic shipping lines. These sanctions were imposed in conjunction with a bilateral set of sanctions by the United States of America (US) and the European Union (EU), and sanctioned the Iranian central bank. The combination of these sanctions means that Iran can no longer use Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) to handle their banking transactions. Consequently, transactions cannot occur in and out of the country.¹ The set of increased sanctions on the financial structure of Iran have led to the collapse of the currency. In 2012, The Guardian newspaper reported that the Iranian Rial had lost seventy-five percent of its currency in one year, leading to soaring prices for staples such as milk, bread, rice, and vegetables.² This form of extreme domestic economic struggle provides evidence that the Iranian targeted sanctions regime is following in the same footsteps as the Iraqi sanctions of the 1990s. The biggest problem with the growth of these sanctions is that the population is left with no real option; their energy depleted by their daily routine to feed themselves, they are left accepting their reality and finding means of dealing with their new fate. The difficulties that have resulted from the Iranian sanctions are so similar and horrifying to the Iraqi sanctions that some policy analysts have questioned whether an airstrike on the country would be less harmful than the long-term impact of current sanctions.³ Unfortunately, power politics and the narrow national interests of the five permanent members of the Security Council overshadow the concern for improving the ability of the UN system to implement and design effective sanctions.⁴

Though economic sanctions seem to be a sound foreign policy tool, which carries a tacit intention that the frustrated population will rise up against their regime to bring them to compliance with the demands of the UN, the reality is much different. The impact of sanctions on the everyday life of the population creates a societal division. The society realizes that basic necessities of life are not available for common use. Those more fortunate have family and friends smuggle in cancer medicine, vitamins, and other medical supplies and equipment, while the less fortunate and the larger segment of the population are quieted by government propaganda. This not only divides the population, it creates a world of them and us. Them, are the sanction imposers, who, the local native government is able to tactfully convince the population, are the source of all of the social and economic problems of the state. Us, are the followers of the native government, who will protect this deceived population no matter how strong the external force of sanctions.

A young population that grows up living under economic sanctions looks at the world and the society around it through a crude lens of economic sanction, targets, and senders, which carry the constant questions of power struggles in international relations. Power differences defined by examples such as the US and China’s “upbeat” outlook for “unprecedented measures” for United Nations driven sanctions on North Korea and on the other hand North Korea’s belligerent retaliation.⁵ These external power conflicts and looming sanctions work as tacit stimuli to increase the internal societal gap of target states as they alienate the population from the world, creating internal political and economic elite.

In the 2000’s as sanctions resurface as the best foreign policy tool, with the same rigor as the early 1990’s and the beginning of the Iraqi sanctions, I began my inquiry into this topic. In the past decade, there has been a great deal of important and innovative work on the effectiveness of sanctions and their political, societal, and legal influence in particular with respect to the ten years of sanctions on Iraq. The attempts made by this book are to showcase these works and introduce a more methodical approach to the presentation of sanctions in the disciplines of international relations, law, and development. Through this approach I attempt to answer questions beyond the effectiveness of sanctions but more directed to the determination of success. Success, which can be measured through a spectrum of perspectives, will be discussed in this book from the two sides of, them and us.

1.1 Sanctions Study and the Current Paradigm

In the past seven years, economic sanctions have generated ever increasing scholarly and policy interests. This is in part due to the proliferation of sanctions schemes since the collapse of the USSR, end of the Cold War, and the increased tracking of the negative effects of sanctions, which are documented more aggressively with the use of new technologies. Whereas before, documenting effects on civilian populations meant extensive fieldwork, data collection, and analysis, new technologies—such as satellite imagery, and improved public health statistics—have made measurements of “human effects” possible. Improved statistical methods have helped analysts determine some of the effects of given sanctions schemes on infant mortality rates, decreases in gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, and lower literacy rates. In the international, humanitarian, and human rights community, these advances are welcomed as they provide Nongovernmental Organizations (NGOs) and advocates with a more tangible cause-effect analysis, which they can then use to lobby policymakers. Thus, the role of the NGOs has proven to be crucial in bringing the negative causes of sanctions to the forefront of the sanctions debate. In fact, NGOs were instrumental in reporting the negative consequences of Iraqi sanctions to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) members during the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. Notwithstanding this information, however, the management of the Iraqi sanctions or mismanagement of these sanctions resulted in extensive inquiries into the use of funds and manner in which food was distributed to the population.

Despite the outcry from the human rights community and progressive organizations, sanctions remain a potent tool in our policy-makers’ political imaginations. The threat of sanctions or strengthening of existing sanctions has been escalating in the past years as the world has begun a battle against terrorism. As I have made changes to this book, the sanctions threat has been so constant that I found myself continually making additional revisions to chapters of this book, while the main underlying problems with sanctions and inquiries that I have raised here remain out of spotlight. The US, a UN member with the greatest influence and most interest in sanctions, has continued to push for increased economic sanctions. Since 2008, US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, has threatened not one but several nations with economic sanctions. The extent of these sanctions was evident from the rhetoric surrounding Assistant Secretary of State of Defense and Research Philip Goldberg’s comments after his visit to Asia. The Associated Press reported in 2009 that, “Philip Goldberg, who had just returned from Asia, told reporters after meeting privately with the Security Council committee monitoring the implementation of sanctions against North Korea that there is ‘a very strong commitment’ not just by China and the US but by all 192 UN member states to enforce the ‘unprecedented measures.’”⁶ On August 2, 2009, The New York Times reported that the Obama administration was contemplating a new round of sanctions against Iran for failure to comply with demands regarding its nuclear program.⁷ Additionally in 2009, days after the first threat of Iranian sanctions, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton threatened Eritrea with economic sanctions for allegedly aiding Somalian opposition fighters.⁸ Granted, the sanctions conversation has gone both ways. At the same time that America threatened new rounds of sanctions against Iran or North Korea, sensible policymakers also made inroads towards easing existing sanctions schemes, such as the sanctions against Syria⁹ and Sudan.¹⁰

Although, it is easier to see the negative impact of sanctions, their use as a sensible foreign policy tool if applied correctly must not be overlooked. In this book I provide an evaluation of sanctions, exposing practical shortcoming of sanctions regimes. I proceed with the assumptions that a more directed, controlled, and procedural sanctions process, can apply the same technologies which are used in exposing negative effect of sanctions, which could lead to their more successful use in practice. Though unilateral sanctions remain important in the political atmosphere, this is primarily a book about an understanding of political affairs surrounding UN economic sanctions and how international law and domestic law coincide in maneuvering through sanctions. Given the prominence of this issue on the world political stage, much has been written on the humanitarian, economic, and legal facets of various sanctions regimes. This book attempts to break new ground by proposing a theoretical method of looking at sanctions—rooted in part in case analysis (historical and current) from a legal and economic perspective—through which particular trade sanctions schemes may be shown as economically inefficient and contradictory to the economic interests of the proponent of the given sanctions regime, as well as the global economy.

1.2 Tyranny of Sanction Evolution

The statement of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on April 30, 2007 identifies the key challenges posed before the UN in crafting and implementing sanctions regimes. His comments bear repeating,

Sanctions should include carrots along with sticks—not only threats, but inducements to elicit compliance. The target must understand what actions it is expected to take. And partial or full compliance should be met by reciprocal steps from the Council, such as easing or lifting sanctions as appropriate.

There is ample evidence that sanctions have enormous potential to contribute to the maintenance of international peace and security when used not as an end in themselves, but in support of a holistic conflict resolution approach that includes prevention, mediation, peacekeeping, and peacebuilding. We should welcome the evolution of sanctions that has taken place: where once they were an often blunt and unfocused instrument, today they have become a more precise tool. Their increased use attests to their growing power. Our challenge is to ensure their credibility and legitimacy in the eyes of the world as unassailable. Only by our combined efforts can we hope to realize the full promise of sanctions in the interest of global peace and security.¹¹

We can extrapolate the following theses and underlying assumptions from this summary and the detailed report of the UN Security Council Working Group on General Issues of Sanctions:

1. Sanctions work—they remain effective foreign policy tools;
2. Current sanctions schemes are “ precise tools ”;
3. UN continues to increase the use of sanctions;
4. UN is working to boost credibility/legitimacy of sanctions.

These four theses are set as the analytical basis used to establish trends in the process of imposing, implementation, and removal of sanctions. Analyzing and unraveling each of these assumptions, particularly in the language of credibility is essential for the policy makers and students of economic sanctions.

When we look at the actual implementation of sanctions we begin to see patterns of failure, which touch upon broader issues of power and politics. The current dominant paradigm admits shortcomings in its approach and practical implementation of sanctions. But these shortcomings are seen as minor faults, which can be “fine-tuned,” ironed out, and resolved by simply developing more precise targeting techniques.¹² John Bolton, the US representative to the UN referred to this need for invigorated efforts to “fine tune” sanctions several times as he responded to questions posed by a US Senate investigation committee inquiring about the Iraqi sanctions administration and the Oil-for-Food program.¹³ Bolton’s comments centered on oversight and accountability, as he criticized the UN’s administration of these sanctions, and elaborated on the lack of current functional oversight in the administration of sanctions.¹⁴ Similar discussion about administration of Oil-for-Food and more broadly the Iraqi sanctions were further intensified after the humanitarian impact of ten years of comprehensive UN sanctions against Iraq became clear and led to the creation of targeted sanctions. While it is true that more precise targeting eliminates many of the grave externalities of sanctions, I challenge the assumption that sanctions will become effective foreign policy tools once this is accomplished and suggest that without resolving the major underlying theoretical and institutional problems of sanctions, no sanction scheme can be effective. Fixed within the sanctions process is the need for clear implementation of any sanctions regime. However, as we will discuss in the following pages, the implementation process remains unclear and ad hoc.

1.3 Iraqi Sanctions and Paul Conlon Papers

Since the formation of the UN, no sanctions regime has been more far reaching than the Iraqi sanctions. For this book, I have relied on a series of papers and documents currently held at the University of Iowa. These declassified documents and material from the Iraqi Sanctions Committee were Dr. Paul Conlon’s personal collection of primary materials from when he served as the former deputy secretary of the Iraq Sanctions Committee.¹⁵ The Iraqi sanctions were the most comprehensive in the history of UN-imposed sanctions. Although ten years have passed since the sanctions were removed after a military attack on the country, which overthrew Saddam Hussein’s government, the results and side effects of the sanctions are slowly surfacing. The scandals of the Oil-for-Food program only became known and investigated after the US military attack on Iraq in 2003 and the removal of sanctions. The scope of these scandals that led to the resignation of several UN officials and wide criticism of U...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Introduction
• 2 UN/Unilateral Sanctions Regimes
• 3 The UN Security Council and Protection of Peace
• 4 Implementation: Strength of Sanctions and Domestic Policy
• 5 Implementation: From Theory to Practice
• 6 Measures of Success/Failure
• 7 Policy Recommendations
• 8 Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index