The Legal Basis And Countermeasures Of American Foreign Economic Sanctions

Economic sanctions are a controversial foreign policy,and the United States,as the country that has used them most,has constructed a comprehensive foreign sanctions regime over the past few decades,which has reached its peak under the Trump administration."According to statistics from the US law firm Gershon,the Trump administration has imposed more than 3,900 sanctions since taking office in 2017,equivalent to wielding the "sanctions stick" three times a day.In addition,the Trump administration has adopted a "comprehensive competition" and"whole-of-government" strategy against China to implement more frequent and more drastic sanctions of all kinds.According to statistics,as of June 1,2020,143 natural persons and entities in China had been included in the sanctions list by the Office of Foreign Assets Control(OFCA)of the U.S.Department of the Treasury.It is evident that U.S.economic sanctions have had an inescapable impact on China,and in view of the current trend,the U.S.will strengthen its economic sanctions against China by various means in the future,so it is necessary to study the content of U.S.foreign economic sanctions in such a situation.The purpose of this paper is to analyze the concept of U.S.foreign economic sanctions and to study the classification system and legal basis of U.S.foreign economic sanctions,and to make more comprehensive suggestions on the response to U.S.foreign economic sanctions from China’s standpoint.This paper mainly adopts the research method of literature and data,on the basis of understanding the existing theories about U.S.economic sanctions at home and abroad and doing some research on the relevant legal documents of U.S.foreign economic sanctions to study the legal basis and response of U.S,foreign economic sanctions,specifically including the following four parts.First,the concept of U.S.foreign economic sanctions is explained step by step:U.S.foreign economic sanctions,as the name suggests,are restrictive economic actions taken by the United States against "non-U.S." individuals,entities,or countries to force the targets to change their behavior by imposing economic coercive measures on them.Second,from "primary sanctions","secondary sanctions" and "list sanctions","sectoral sanctions" and "Second,the classification system of U.S.economic sanctions isdescribed in two dimensions:vertical and horizontal,including their definitions,methods of sanctions,and consequences of their application.Third,the international and domestic law bases of U.S.foreign economic sanctions are illustrated separately:U.S.foreign economic sanctions can be divided into three types from the perspective of international law:countermeasures,economic coercion and economic intervention,and the international law bases of these three types are analyzed and confirmed to be legitimate.The domestic law basis of U.S.foreign economic sanctions is divided into three levels:laws,executive orders and sanctions regulations,and in terms of laws,we have selected three general laws:the Trading with the Enemy Act,the International Emergency Economic Powers Act,the United Nations Participation Act,and two special laws:the D’Amato Act and the Hong Kong Autonomy Act.At the level of Executive Orders,we use Executive Order 13936 as an example to explain the content and style of Executive Orders,and at the level of sanctions regulations we mainly choose the Hong Kong Related Sanctions Ordinance for a model interpretation.Finally,based on the analysis of the development characteristics of U.S.economic sanctions against China in recent years,this paper puts forward corresponding response suggestions from the perspective of the state and enterprises to cope with U.S.economic sanctions against China.Among them,at the national level,we should actively promote the improvement and application of China’s Blocking Measures,build China’s response mechanism to U.S.economic sanctions,and actively promote the internationalization of the RMB.At the enterprise and individual levels,we put forward specific suggestions for individuals and entities to respond from the perspectives of pre-transaction prevention and post-sanction relief,respectively:mainly by strengthening pre-transaction risk assessment and optimizing contract terms to achieve Pre-trade prevention is achieved by strengthening pre-trade risk assessment and optimizing contract terms;post-sanction relief is achieved through administrative remedies such as overall release,license application,application for release,administrative review,and judicial or quasi-judicial remedies such as the International Court of Justice,WTO,and U.S.domestic courts.This paper has many shortcomings,and some of the theories in this paper may be somewhat outdated because of the rapidly changing legal policies related to U.S.foreign economic sanctions.