The world in the maze of sanctions: Ambiguity of empirical evidence

Abstract

The article examines various effects of sanction restrictions on target countries. To achieve this, the results of over 50 academic studies from the past decade regarding the impact of sanctions on different countries are analyzed and structured. This analysis is based on the study of sanction episodes predominantly from the 1980s to 2015. It is noted that sanctions have been extensively employed in the past decade, attributed to the intensification of international competition and increased conflict in global development. It is shown that the effects of sanctions exhibit strong ambiguity, temporal variability, and multidirectionality. Both negative and certain stimulating changes in sanction effects are identified and systematized in the contexts of international trade and foreign direct investment. It is demonstrated that sanctions sometimes act as triggers for structural changes in sub-sanctioned economies, altering their integration into global production. The increasing involvement of various countries in sanction confrontations significantly alters the conditions for national economic policies, oriented towards structural changes and long-term perspectives, primarily for industrial policies. For many countries, the task of formulating industrial policy in line with the logic of restructuring global value chains and their participation becomes relevant. This task is characteristic not only for countries targeted by sanctions but also for sanction-sending countries, for which the reverse sanction effects are even less predictable.