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Article: Serious about sanctions. (positive and negative aspects of economic sanctions)
- Article from:
- The National Interest
- Article date:
- September 22, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 The National Interest, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Self-inflicted wounds. Chicken soup diplomacy. Boomerangs. Good intentions gone bad. These clipped responses reflect the accepted wisdom among policy cognoscenti about the scant value of economic sanctions to the United States. Even Hollywood is derisive; in the summer 1997 blockbuster Air Force One, "President" Harrison Ford denounces as "cowardly" a policy of applying mere economic sanctions to terrorist states.
Curiously, though, this near consensus has not slowed the congressional urge to apply sanctions. In the past three years the United States has imposed or threatened economic sanctions 60 times against 35 different countries, affecting 42 percent of the ...