Sanctions in US Foreign Policy

3 Credits · Level: Graduate

As economic sanctions have become an ever more complex and ubiquitous tool of U.S. foreign policy, America's national security apparatus increasingly has oriented itself around their application. Sanctions bureaus have proliferated across the Executive Branch, and today most major law firms, corporations, and business consultancies maintain robust sanctions compliance departments. How did we get here? In 1808, Thomas Jefferson noted that when confronted with foreign threats, "three alternatives alone are to be chosen from. 1. embargo. 2. war. 3. submission & tribute." More than 200 years later, these remain our choices. And when America is unwilling to go to war or submit to foreign impositions, Jefferson’s “embargo”--what we today call economic sanctions--invariably emerges as the policy of choice. This course will explore how the sanctions tool has evolved, becoming increasingly sophisticated and frequently America's policy of first resort. It will look at how sanctions have been applied in recent cases, to include Iran, Cuba, South Africa, Russia, and China. It also will explore innovations in sanctions, in particular financial sanctions, which derive their power from the U.S. dollar's role as the world's reserve currency, and secondary sanctions, which seek to compel persons and entities beyond the jurisdiction of the United States to conform their conduct to U.S. policy.