Analysis Of The Practical Application Of Smart Sanctions

Economic sanctions is a popular way to deal with the foreign affairs,but it's controversial that whether economic sanctions is effective,especially the comprehensive sanctions.On the one hand,comprehensive sanctions have caused humanitarian catastrophe,vulnerable groups of targeted country suffered a lot,for example,the comprehensive economic sanctions against Iraq has caused a serious humanitarian disaster,lead to international concern for the disadvantages of comprehensive sanctions.On the other hand,comprehensive economic sanctions do not always reach their goals.The emergence of smart sanctions theory stems from the international community's concern about the humanitarian impact of sanctions and how to improve the success rate of economic sanctions.Smart or targeted sanctions are aimed to hurt elite supporters of the targeted regime,while imposing minimal hardship on the mass public.Smart sanctions have theoretical advantages,but there are differences between theory and practice.The first part of the article sorts out the background,definition and application of smart sanctions,including the difference with comprehensive sanctions.The second part analyzes the typical cases,and found that,smart sanctions being more humane but less effective than comprehensive sanctions.The third part analyzed how smart sanctions are used in the case of Europe and the United Nations sanctions against Russia after the Ukrainian crisis,sanctions are very ambitious but didn't reach the goal.The fourth part is the reflection of smart sanctions,there are advantages and disadvantages.So smart sanctions theory can meet the needs to do some thing in the face of target state transgressions,can calm the humanitarian concerns down,can unite the loose alliance and isolate the evil regime,but the application of smart sanctions don't solve the policy problem of coercing the target state into changing its policies.