Towards a Sociological Approach to International Sanctions:Securitization as Causal Mechanism in Sanctions conflicts

In reflexive security studies it was successfully argued for a contextualisation of meaning. This poses a whole new range of challenging questions. How does a security communication travel from one place to another? And how is communication distorted by situatedness of initiator and addressee? This paper argues that one source of meaning emergence is provided by the context of communication in sanctions conflict. The paper outlines a theoretical framework that takes meaning of sanctions in conflicts between states as contingent and dynamic and develops a model that links securitization as a causal mechanism in the processing of meaning to a notion of social conflict inspired by modern systems theory. The paper further makes the case for differentiating sanctions into negative, positive and combined sanctions strategies. The use of sanctions in the cross-strait conflict between China and Taiwan serves as an illustration of the developed approach.