Effectiveness of UN Sanctions

From the inner quirks and hallway politics of the Security Council to the extensive and bureaucratic machinations involved in Ecosoc and NGOs, the UN as a whole is an intricate web of aspirations, optimistic endeavors, reluctant abdications, and abject failures. The stated goals of the United Nations are above all an ideal.

It is both admirable and desirable for the UN to seek to accomplish its goal of perpetuating international peace and security. However, the founders knew from the onset that every part of the UN would have to be a compromise between the Wilsonian ideals associated with the League of Nations and the emotionless calculations of realism.

Today's UN is no different. Take the recent sanction against North Korea this June following the DPRK's missile launches. Though enforcement seems feasible, there has been little success in stopping North Korean weapons exportation. The recent seizure of 10 containers of an arms shipment is a good sign.

That the seizure occurred several weeks ago and did not cause a flare-up in the rhetoric of the DPRK is also a good sign. There are several aspects of the seizure, however, that bear consideration:

First, the threat of war from North Korea should an American ship intercept a ship bound to or from North Korea under the new sanction limits American actions. Because of this, the UN resolution, though binding, is without much of its power. Second, the fact that the arms were headed for Iran, another international pariah, speaks to the effectiveness of UN sanctions.

Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.
-John F. Kennedy