What are economic sanctions, and are they effective?
来源:World Economic Forum;发表于:2022-03-03;人气指数:350
What are
economic sanctions, and are they effective?
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/03/what-are-sanctions-do-they-ever-work-and-could-they-stop-russia-s-invasion-of-ukraine/
Sanctions are applied
to impact the relationship between one state and another
Image:
Unsplash/Anastasiya Romanova
01 Mar 2022
Christopher
Michaelsen
Associate Professor,
UNSW Sydney
*In response to
Russia's invasion of Ukraine, multiple nations have cast restrictions on
Russia.
*Despite the
sanctions, Russia may only feel the effects of them in the longer term, making
them less effective.
*There might be a
chance Russia can evade some of the implemented sanctions.
A key feature of the
international community’s response to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has
been the adoption of sanctions.
But what exactly are
sanctions and how do they operate in practice?
And most importantly,
are they likely to have any meaningful impact?
What are sanctions?
Sanctions are
coercive measures that can be applied to diplomatic, economic and cultural
relations between states. Commonly non-military in nature, they are imposed by
one state against another (unilateral sanctions) or by an international
organisation, such as the United Nations (collective sanctions).
Historically,
measures have ranged from comprehensive sanctions to more targeted measures
prohibiting trade in particular items, such as arms, timber, or diamonds.
Some sanctions have
circumscribed particular activities understood to benefit a target, such as
diplomatic, sporting, and cultural relations, as well as travel.
They have also
targeted particular individuals and groups who pose a threat to peace and
security, including political elites, rebel groups, or terrorist organisations.
How do economic
sanctions operate in practice?
Economic sanctions
are multidimensional. They tend to include travel bans and financial sanctions.
Financial sanctions consist of targeted asset freezes and restrictions on a
wide variety of financial markets and services.
Where the financial
sanction is an asset freeze, it is generally prohibited to deal with the frozen
funds held by a designated person or entity.
Funds are defined to
include financial assets of every kind: cash, cheques, money orders, credit,
debts, stocks and shares, interest, dividends or other income from or generated
by assets.
The designation of
targeted individuals and entities can occur on the basis of a national listing
procedure (for the US see here, for the UK here, for Australia here).
Or, this designation
may happen as a result of a sanctions regime adopted by an international
organisation, which is then implemented by its members (for current UN
sanctions regimes see here,
for the EU here).
This twin-track
approach is generally reflected in the sanctions practice of states which
maintain “consolidated lists”.
Separate
“consolidated lists” are kept for those individuals and entities listed on the
basis of unilateral sanctions and those listed as a consequence of collective
sanctions.
Some international
best practice exists regarding sanctions implementation, such as guidance
by the G7 Financial Action Task Force. But compliance will always depend on
individual countries and the particular features of domestic companies.
Financial
institutions, such as banks, will have in place automated procedures to filter
incoming transactions before entering, and outgoing transactions before leaving
their internal systems.
Are economic
sanctions effective?
They can be.
The impact on listed
individuals and entities can be severe, as illustrated by the internationally
litigated cases of Kadi and Al Barakaat International Foundation v Council
of the European Union or Nada v Switzerland (both cases in the
context of financial counter-terrorism sanctions).
However, the general
effectiveness of economic sanctions is uncertain, not least because it is
empirically difficult to measure it.
According to Dursun
Peksen, a sanctions expert at the University of Memphis, economic sanctions
result in meaningful behavioural change in the targeted country about 40% of
the time.
Yet, as a recent
study by the US government demonstrates, establishing clear causality is
impossible.
For example, a
sanctioned country or individual may decide to change their behaviour for many
reasons. Some of these changes may be unrelated to the sanctions.
What sanctions are
now applied against Russia?
The international
community has imposed a mix of economic and diplomatic sanctions, with countries
acting both unilaterally and collectively.
The US and the UK
have introduced unilateral sanctions targeting Russia’s two largest banks,
Sberbank and VTB Bank. They have also frozen the assets and restricted travel
of key Russian oligarchs. Canada and Australia have followed suit.
Germany has indicated
it is abandoning the Nord Stream 2 Baltic Sea gas pipeline project, designed to
double the flow of Russian gas direct to the country. Poland, Czech Republic,
Bulgaria and Estonia have closed their airspace for Russian airlines.
As for collective sanctions,
the UN Security Council will remain unable to impose any sanctions due to the
veto power Russia holds as a permanent member. Indeed, Russia has already used
this veto power to block a resolution condemning the invasion of
Ukraine.
The EU, on the other
hand, has quickly introduced asset freezes and travel bans preventing listed
individuals from entering or transiting through EU territory.
EU sanctions now
apply to 555 Russian individuals and 52 entities, including 351 members of the Russian
State Duma who have backed the aggression against Ukraine.
The EU has since
moved to adopt further sanction packages, which include targeting President
Putin and Foreign Minister Lavrov directly.
Together with the US
and the UK, the EU has also agreed to remove select Russian banks from
the SWIFT banking system, the financial messaging infrastructure that
links the world’s banks.
The Council of
Europe in Strasbourg has also applied unprecedented diplomatic sanctions.
It has suspended Russia from its rights of representation in the Committee of
Ministers and in the Parliamentary Assembly.
Sanctions tend to be
non-violent
Image: The
Conversation
Are the sanctions
likely to have any meaningful impact?
Too early to say, but
probably not in the short term.
The unilateral and
collective sanctions that have been applied are comprehensive. They have also
been adopted swiftly. Some of the measures, such as targeting Putin and Lavrov
personally, are unprecedented.
On the other hand,
significant gaps remain and pose a considerable risk of fragmentation.
The example of
Switzerland is a case in point. The Swiss government has voiced support
for complementing EU sanctions. Yet, it has so far shied away from applying
targeted asset freezes of those individuals listed by the EU, the US and other
countries.
As a New York
Times analysis details, there is also growing concern Russian companies
may evade sanctions by turning to cryptocurrency tools, including the so-called
digital ruble and ransomware.