US places sanctions in Iran... again.

What's new here? Nothing. America has placed sanctions in Iran before, has tried and failed to place UN sanctions on Iran, got one to work in December of 2006, are still trying to get more sanctions on Iran, and now they have another one.

According to the BBC of October 25, 2007:

"The US has stepped up its sanctions on Iran for "supporting terrorists" and pursuing nuclear activities. The new measures target the finances of Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps and three state-owned banks."

Do sanctions work? I would have to say that on balance it does not. Certainly, in the case of the South African apartheid, it did work. But in other cases, especially the Darfur issue, it has not worked. I think that the reason for this is that we live in an increasing globalized society. The obvious logical extrapolation to that is the decreased effect one economy can have another's economy. The US taking unilateral of even weak multilateral sanctions against Iran will have highly limited effects compared to the strong multilateral response in the case of South Africa because the other countries that are not in support or bound to honor the sanction will fill in the vacant spots of trade and what not and thus continue to prop up that nation's economy.

In other words, because of globalization and the fact that we all trade with one another,when one or several countries to ban trading with a nation in a limited regard, it is ineffective because the targeted country can find other ways to fill in that missing trade by trading with other countries. The only way for sanctions to truly work is for it to be a strong multilateral response.