Haass..

 

Economic sanctions are increasingly being used to promote the full range of American foreign policy objectives.

Yet all too often sanctions turn out to be little more than expressions of U.S. preferences that hurt American economic interests without changing the target’s behavior for the better. 

As a rule, sanctions need to be less unilateral and more focused on the problem at hand. 

Congress and the executive branch need to institute far more rigorous oversight of sanctions, both prior to adopting them and regularly thereafter, to ensure that the expected benefits outweigh likely costs and that sanctions accomplish more than alternative foreign policy tools.

[Economic Sanctions: Too Much of a Bad Thing. Richard N. Haass Monday, June 1, 1998.]