Are economic sanctions effective?

Economic sanctions are unethical and not effective

Question: Are economic sanctions effective?
Position‹2 of 2: No, economic sanctions are not effective
Argument1 of 2›: Economic sanctions are unethical and not effective

The theory behind economic sanctions neglects to account for the fact that impoverished people are more easily affected than wealthy individuals.

The argument

Even in instances where economic sanctions work, proponents of this position argue, they are not actually effective — and part of the disagreement is definitional. To be effective is to be successful in producing the desired or intended result. Unless the intended result of economic sanctions is to financially and economically hurt the civilians of a country, sanctions are not effective, because civilian hardship is what they reliably produce while the intended change in government behaviour is not. The reason the burden lands where it does is a matter of who is exposed to it. Most citizens have little say in what their government chooses to do. Imposing sanctions simply punishes an entire group of people for the behavior of a couple powerful and wealthy leaders, which severs the connection a sanction depends on: the pain is applied to one group in the hope that a different group will respond to it. Narrowing the instrument does not solve the problem either. Although sanctions that specifically target wealthy leaders cause much less collateral damage, they are not effective enough to justify their existence. These sanctions, such as those prohibiting banks from dealing with a given country, will freeze some of the assets of wealthy leaders. However, it will also freeze the assets of average citizens, because the mechanism acts on a country's financial channels rather than on named individuals. And even where both are caught, the effect is asymmetric: the wealthy leaders can withstand long-term economic turmoil, and the average citizen cannot. Simply put, sanctions are not effective enough to justify the collateral damage they cause to citizens. Because they impose the cost on the people least able to bear it and least able to alter the conduct being punished, economic sanctions are unethical and not effective.

Premises

[P1]To be effective is to produce the intended result, and the intended result of sanctions is not to harm ordinary civilians. [P2] Yet broad sanctions punish an entire population for the behaviour of a few powerful leaders, who can withstand economic turmoil that ruins average citizens. [P3] Even targeted sanctions freeze the assets of ordinary people and are not effective enough to justify that collateral damage. [C] Therefore, because economic sanctions are unethical and harm the wrong people, economic sanctions are not effective.

Counter-arguments

It is expected that sanctions will result in collateral damage. If world leaders see that their citizens are hurting, they will be incentivised to help. Though they may not do so out of compassion, they will do so to retain power. While economically hurting the average citizen is not ideal, it is the lesser of two evils. For example, imposing sanctions on Syria is not ideal and has most likely contributed to the instability in the country. However, allowing trade with a country that openly supports terrorism would have far more violent and thus much worse consequences. In this way, economic sanctions are effective - they are the most ethical of two unethical options.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Economically hurting the average citizen will cause leaders to change their behavior.