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Venezuela holds 70% of Latin America's natural gas reserves, which it could export to Colombia and Trinidad to increase revenues.
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Past Event
June 5, 2018
12:30 pm - 2:00 pm
Abstract:
Nations and international organizations are increasingly using sanctions as a means to achieve their foreign policy aims. However, sanctions are ineffective if they are executed without a clear strategy responsive to the nature and changing behavior of the target. In The Art of Sanctions, Richard Nephew offers a much-needed practical framework for planning and applying sanctions that focuses not just on the initial sanctions strategy but also, crucially, on how to calibrate along the way and how to decide when sanctions have achieved maximum effectiveness.
Nephew will make a presentation on his book, outlining its main themes and discussing its implications for today’s issues. The book itself develops guidelines for interpreting targets’ responses to sanctions based on two critical factors: pain and resolve. The efficacy of sanctions lies in the application of pain against a target, but targets may have significant resolve to resist, tolerate, or overcome this pain. Understanding the interplay of pain and resolve is central to using sanctions both successfully and humanely. With attention to these two key variables, and to how they change over the course of a sanctions regime, policy makers can pinpoint when diplomatic intervention is likely to succeed or when escalation is necessary. Focusing on lessons learned from sanctions on both Iran and Iraq, the book provides policymakers with practical guidance on how to measure and respond to pain and resolve in the service of strong and successful sanctions regimes.
Speakers:
Richard Nephew is a senior research scholar at the center on global energy policy at Columbia University. He is the former principal deputy coordinator for sanctions policy at the State Department and Director for Iran at the National Security Council at the Obama White House.
Moderator:
Erica Moret, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies
Dr. Moret is Senior Researcher at Global Governance Centre. She is also the Coordinator of the Geneva International Sanctions Network.
The recent military operation to remove Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores raises several implications for the future of Venezuela and Latin America, geopolitics, and energy markets. Cosponsored by SIPA’s Institute of Global Politics (IGP) and Center for Global Energy Policy (CGEP), along with Columbia’s Institute of Latin American Studies (ILAS), this webinar will analyze the circumstances and impact of their capture and extradition to New York to face narcoterrorism and drug trafficking charges.
The Columbia Global Energy Summit 2026 is an annual event dedicated to thought-provoking discussions around the critical energy and climate challenges facing the global community.
On October 22, the United States Department of the Treasury announced the imposition of sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil, as a penalty for what it characterized as a lack of Russian commitment to ending the war in Ukraine.
As the Israel-Iran conflict continues to unfold, it remains unclear whether a ceasefire will hold or fighting will resume. This uncertainty carries significant implications for energy markets in the Middle East and around the world.
Venezuela holds 70% of Latin America's natural gas reserves, which it could export to Colombia and Trinidad to increase revenues.
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In discussing the dramatic seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, over the weekend, President Donald Trump declared that the United States would now “take back” the country’s oil. Yet he has offered little clarity on what exactly this means.
