Fostering agreements or hampering compromise: the context-specific effect of sanctions in peace negotiations

Abstract Whether sanctions push conflict parties to reach a negotiated settlement and contribute to ending violent conflicts is disputed in the literature. So far, discussions on the effect and success of sanctions have primarily centered around their costs for the target and proper implementation. Building on individual-level experimental insights from political psychology, we argue that the effectiveness of sanctions as a conflict management tool also depends on the conflict context. We focus on intrastate conflicts, suggesting that sanctions have different effects depending on the conflict’s incompatibility. In territorial conflicts closely linked to identities and immaterial values, we expect sanctions to cause a negative backlash that makes the conflict parties less willing to compromise. In government conflicts, however, the additional costs of sanctions could lead the parties to make more far-reaching concessions. We study the impact of sanctions on the outcome of peace negotiations in intrastate conflicts between 1990 and 2012, using a novel measure of conflict parties’ willingness and ability to make concessions. In line with our theoretical argument, our analysis presents evidence for a differential effect of implemented sanctions according to conflict type. The analysis also provides insight into how these effects evolve, indicating that both effects diminish over time.