STRATFOR on Economic Sanctions

In the final installment of our series of videos produced by our partners at Stratfor, Reva Bhalla looks at how economic sanctions are used as instruments of foreign policy. She begins by describing the three forms that economic sanctions can take – 1) the imposition of tariffs upon imports from the targeted country, 2) the blocking of shipments to and from a state, and 3) the seizure or freezing of overseas assets. Regardless of which option is selected, however, Bhalla also warns us that economic sanctions alone are unlikely to change the political behavior of targeted states. In fact, in the hands of deft propagandists they can be portrayed as acts of aggression against an embattled people. This negative publicity, along with the shifting sands of national and geopolitical interests, can ultimately make economic sanctions difficult to sustain over the long-term.