ECONOMIC SANCTIONS AND CULTURE

We address empirically the question of why international economic sanctions are, or are not, chosen as instruments of foreign policy and the question of what determines their success. We hypothesize that cultural linkages between nations are an important factor in explaining both instrument choice and conflict outcomes. Countries that share significant cultural attributes are found to be less likely to apply economic sanctions against one another than countries lacking such cultural ties. However, it is precisely in the case of culturally similar sender and target nations that sanctions are most likely to succeed.