2
1 Introduction
Economic sanctions have always been an instrument of foreign policy. The instrument
entered diplomacy long before World War I and can be traced back to ancient Greece.
Taking into account the more recent history, a list of all the imposed sanctions in the
20
th
century shows nearly 120 cases before 1990 (Hufbauer, Schott, and Elliot 1990b).
A brief review of these cases illustrates the important role that economic sanctions
have played in many countries’ foreign policy since World War I, most of all in the
conduct of US foreign policy (e.g. Gordan 1988; Selden 1999). Globally concerted
international sanctions, however, are a relatively new phenomenon. Only the end of
the Cold War brought a new willingness among the members of the United Nations
(UN) to use the compulsory measures foreseen in Chapter VII of the UN Charter. This
breakthrough in international cooperation in the beginning of the 1990s led to a quite
frequent use of economic sanctions as an instrument of international politics (Iraq
1990, former Yugoslavia 1991, 1992, and 1998, Libya 1992, Somalia 1992, the Khmer
Rouge-controlled areas of Cambodia 1992, Haiti 1993, the UNITA faction in Angola
1993, 1997, and 1998, Rwanda 1994, Sudan 1996, Sierra Leone 1997, and Afghani-
stan 1999, see Cortright and Lopez 2000; Elliot and Hufbauer 1999).
Before 1990, the UN Security Council had imposed sanctions only twice, against
Rhodesia in 1966 (economic sanctions) and South Africa in 1977 (arms embargo).
Although the arms embargo remained the only mandatory UN resolution on South
Africa, South Africa was always the most prominent test case for international sanc-
tions, at least in three respects:
• Length of time of the international debate on imposing sanctions: South Africa was
first subjected to international sanctions in the 1960s and the issue of imposing
sanctions against the apartheid regime was debated for decades within nearly every
international body. South Africa gradually became more and more a pariah in the
international community because of its policies of racial discrimination, political
disenfranchisement, human rights abuse, and international aggression (Klotz 1995).
In South Africa itself, the African National Congress (ANC), the South African
Communist Party, trade unions, religious groups, and literally hundreds of other ac-
Convention