The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics (240 page)
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sanctions
Punitive diplomatic, economic, and social actions taken by the international community against a state that has violated international law. Technically they may also refer to military actions with the same purpose. Sanctions are a crucial part of the policy of
collective security
. They range from suspension of diplomatic contact, and blockage of communication, through restriction or cessation of some or all trade, to military strikes. The League of Nations had weak provisions for sanction, and Anglo-American restrictions on the supply of steel and oil to Japan because of its invasion of China were one of the causes of Japan's entry into the Second World War. The United Nations
Security Council
has the legal right to instigate compulsory sanctions, but this was little exercised during the Cold War because of the paralysis of that body by the veto.
Sanctions were applied to Rhodesia in 1966, and more lightly to South Africa. Post-Cold War, they were applied to Iraq after its invasion of Kuwait, and to Serbia in the context of the messy war that followed the disintegration of Yugoslavia. Fierce arguments continue as to whether economic sanctions are an effective form of political pressure, or whether they merely inflict hardship on the population while strengthening the position of the offending government. All sanctions regimes attract profit-seeking smugglers, and the case of Iraq suggests that very harsh economic sanctions, even when accompanied by military action, do not guarantee either a change of policy or a change of government.
BB
collective security
. They range from suspension of diplomatic contact, and blockage of communication, through restriction or cessation of some or all trade, to military strikes. The League of Nations had weak provisions for sanction, and Anglo-American restrictions on the supply of steel and oil to Japan because of its invasion of China were one of the causes of Japan's entry into the Second World War. The United Nations
Security Council
has the legal right to instigate compulsory sanctions, but this was little exercised during the Cold War because of the paralysis of that body by the veto.
Sanctions were applied to Rhodesia in 1966, and more lightly to South Africa. Post-Cold War, they were applied to Iraq after its invasion of Kuwait, and to Serbia in the context of the messy war that followed the disintegration of Yugoslavia. Fierce arguments continue as to whether economic sanctions are an effective form of political pressure, or whether they merely inflict hardship on the population while strengthening the position of the offending government. All sanctions regimes attract profit-seeking smugglers, and the case of Iraq suggests that very harsh economic sanctions, even when accompanied by military action, do not guarantee either a change of policy or a change of government.
BB
Sandinism
The Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) was created in 1961 by Nicaraguan admirers of the Cuban revolution of 1959. It took its name from the nationalist hero, General Augusto Cesar Sandino , who fought a guerrilla war against US occupying forces in the late 1920s.
Early attempts to follow Cuban strategic advice led to guerrilla setbacks, but the FSLN gradually adapted its strategy and in the struggle against the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza Debayle in the 1970s it relied more on popular urban insurrection than rural guerrilla warfare.
Strategic and tactical internal differences did not prevent the Sandinistas from uniting to depose Somoza in 1979, but did leave the Front divided into three factions. The solution was a nine-member collective leadership, the National Directorate, which remained powerful even after Daniel Ortega's election to the Nicaraguan presidency in 1984.
Sandinism developed as an ideological hybrid, with influences from Marxism, nationalism, dependency theory, and Catholic Liberation Theology. In government between 1979–90 Sandinista policies were based on political pluralism, a mixed economy, international nonalignment, and social reform.
In the early 1980s the Sandinista government enacted a land reform and achieved substantial improvements in health care, education, and social welfare programmes. Its radical policies antagonized the United States which sponsored attacks by ‘contra’ rebels and boycotted the Nicaraguan economy. Sandinista popularity declined due to compulsory military service, hyperinflation, and shortages.
The FSLN was defeated at the polls in 1990, having won elections in 1984. Subsequently it embraced social democracy.
RG
Early attempts to follow Cuban strategic advice led to guerrilla setbacks, but the FSLN gradually adapted its strategy and in the struggle against the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza Debayle in the 1970s it relied more on popular urban insurrection than rural guerrilla warfare.
Strategic and tactical internal differences did not prevent the Sandinistas from uniting to depose Somoza in 1979, but did leave the Front divided into three factions. The solution was a nine-member collective leadership, the National Directorate, which remained powerful even after Daniel Ortega's election to the Nicaraguan presidency in 1984.
Sandinism developed as an ideological hybrid, with influences from Marxism, nationalism, dependency theory, and Catholic Liberation Theology. In government between 1979–90 Sandinista policies were based on political pluralism, a mixed economy, international nonalignment, and social reform.
In the early 1980s the Sandinista government enacted a land reform and achieved substantial improvements in health care, education, and social welfare programmes. Its radical policies antagonized the United States which sponsored attacks by ‘contra’ rebels and boycotted the Nicaraguan economy. Sandinista popularity declined due to compulsory military service, hyperinflation, and shortages.
The FSLN was defeated at the polls in 1990, having won elections in 1984. Subsequently it embraced social democracy.
RG
sans-culottes
Literally, ‘without breeches’. Urban supporters of extreme factions in the
French Revolution
who wore trousers, rather than aristocratic breeches.
French Revolution
who wore trousers, rather than aristocratic breeches.
Sartre , Jean-Paul
(1905–80)
French political and literary writer and activist. Sartre was the best-known exponent in the twentieth century of
existentialism
, in
L'Être et le néant
(Being and Nothingness, 1943) and
Existentialism and Humanism
(English translation, 1980). Sartre's statements of the pain of existence (‘Man is condemned to be free’) are easier to understand in his philosophical and literary works (notably
Huis Clos
(In Camera, 1943) than in his political works. Sartre came to believe after the Second World War that existentialism implied a particular sort of intellectual, activist, and (at least in principle) violent
Marxism
by virtue of its assertion that there are no objective moral rules. Some have seen his later work (especially
Critique of Dialectical Reason
, English translation, i, 1978; ii, 1991) as a reconciliation of existentialism and Marxism; others as the rejection of the first for the second.
French political and literary writer and activist. Sartre was the best-known exponent in the twentieth century of
existentialism
, in
L'Être et le néant
(Being and Nothingness, 1943) and
Existentialism and Humanism
(English translation, 1980). Sartre's statements of the pain of existence (‘Man is condemned to be free’) are easier to understand in his philosophical and literary works (notably
Huis Clos
(In Camera, 1943) than in his political works. Sartre came to believe after the Second World War that existentialism implied a particular sort of intellectual, activist, and (at least in principle) violent
Marxism
by virtue of its assertion that there are no objective moral rules. Some have seen his later work (especially
Critique of Dialectical Reason
, English translation, i, 1978; ii, 1991) as a reconciliation of existentialism and Marxism; others as the rejection of the first for the second.
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