Why sanctions against Iran are counterproductive: Conflict resolution and state–society relations
| DOI | 10.1177/0020702014521561 |
| Author | Ali Fathollah-Nejad |
| Date | 01 March 2014 |
| Published date | 01 March 2014 |
| Subject Matter | Scholarly Essays |
International Journal
2014, Vol. 69(1) 48–65
!The Author(s) 2014
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DOI: 10.1177/0020702014521561
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Scholarly Essay
Why sanctions
against Iran are
counterproductive:
Conflict resolution and
state–society relations
Ali Fathollah-Nejad
PhD candidate in International Relations, Department of
Development Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies
(SOAS), University of London, and Berlin, Germany
Abstract
This article critically examines the ramifications of the international sanctions regime
against Iran on two fronts: the conflict pitting Iran against the West, and the impact of
the sanctions on state–society relations. On both accounts, it finds the dominant nar-
rative, according to which sanctions would facilitate conflict resolution while weakening
the authoritarian state, to be misleading. Instead, it demonstrates, on the one hand, how
sanctions have hardened the opposing fronts and therefore prolonged the conflict
between Iran and the West, and on the other, how they have cemented the domestic
power structure in the Islamic Republic and weakened Iran’s civil society.
Keywords
Iran sanctions regime, conflict resolution, Iran nuclear conflict, state–society relations in
Iran, Iranian civil society, Geneva Agreement of November 2013
Those who have decided to impose sanctions on Iran have justified that decision on
the basis of a number of key claims and in the expectation that economic sanctions
would bring about specific results. This article tests these claims against two cri-
teria. First, it examines how far sanctions have been able to alter Iran’s nuclear and
foreign policies. Second, it scrutinizes the ramifications of sanctions on state–
society relations in Iran.
Corresponding author:
Email: afn@soas.ac.uk
The foreign-policy level: Hardening the fronts rather than
forcing policy change
In the 1980s, the dominant political rhetoric concerning Iran was that the state
supported terrorism against the USA and its allies (‘‘international terrorism’’).
Since the 1990s another powerful claim has been added, namely the alleged
threat that Iran’s nuclear program poses to ‘‘international peace and security.’’
Sanctions are usually presented as a quasi-peaceful means to achieve foreign-
policy goals and, as such, inherently part of a purely diplomatic approach geared
toward avoiding a military confrontation. However, this is not necessarily true. As
US political scientist Robert A. Pape has noted, sanctions are often a prelude to
war, not an alternative to it.
1
In fact, as the Iraqi case demonstrates, sanctions can
even be the last step preceding a military strike.
2
In other words, ‘‘smart bombs’’
may well succeed ‘‘smart sanctions.’’
Even short of this worst-case scenario, sanctions have not facilitated the reso-
lution of conflicts; on the contrary, they tend to harden the opposing fronts, who
see the sanctions through fundamentally different prisms.
3
While the West con-
ceives sanctions in a cost-benefit framework, i.e. the heavier the costs imposed on
the targeted country by way of sanctions, the more willing the sanctioned state will
be to offer concessions, Iran sees them as an illegitimate pressure that must be
resisted.
4
This explains why in the last couple of years the escalation of sanctions
has been accompanied by the escalation of the nuclear program (see Figure 1).
5
For
example, in 2006—when the Iran sanctions were elevated to an unequivocally
crippling dimension by the USA and the European Union—Iran had a thousand
centrifuges. By 2013 that number had increased nineteen fold. Throughout the so-
called ‘‘nuclear crisis,’’ however, Western capitals have largely ignored this reality
of the nuclear dynamics in the wake of sanctions.
Policymakers in the West have for too long devoted much more time and energy
to identifying which new set of sanctions to impose than to making a
committed and creative engagement to finding a diplomatic solution to the
1. See Robert A. Pape, ‘‘Why economic sanctions still do not work,’’ International Security 23, no. 1
(summer 1998): 66–77; see also Robert A. Pape, ‘‘Why economic sanctions do not work,’’
International Security 22, no. 2 (fall 1997): 90–136.
2. See, for example, Hans von Sponeck, A Different Kind of War: The UN Sanctions Regime in Iraq
(New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2006). Von Sponeck served as the UN Humanitarian
Coordinator for Iraq between October 1998 and February 2000, when he resigned in protest against
the UN’s Iraq sanctions policy.
3. International Crisis Group, Spider Web: The Making and Unmaking of Iran Sanctions (Brussels:
International Crisis Group, Middle East Report, No. 138, February 2013).
4. This explains the Islamic Republic’s proclamation in the second half of 2012 that it would operate
an ‘‘economy of resistance’’ in the face of sanctions. See, for example, Najmeh Bozorgmehr, ‘‘Iran
develops ‘economy of resistance,’’’ Financial Times, 10 September 2012, http://www.ft.com/intl/
cms/s/0/27ec70a6-f911-11e1-8d92-00144feabdc0.html (accessed 3 December 2013).
5. Bijan Khajehpour, Reza Marashi, and Trita Parsi, ‘‘Never Give In and Never Give Up’’: The Impact
of Sanctions on Tehran’s Nuclear Calculations (Washington, DC: National Iranian American
Council, March 2013), 27 (graph 5.5: ‘‘Sanctions escalation vs. nuclear escalation’’, reproduced
with permission).
Fathollah-Nejad 49
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