ABSTRACT
Recent experience with the employment of external economic sanctions to effect domestic political change has seriously shattered the popular myth that they offer a cheap and easy alternative to war as an instrument of national policy. Part of the persisting appeal of sanctions is no doubt the opportunity they offer to indulge legitimately in a little bloodless headbashing. However, a more substantial argument in their defence is their overall record. Rarely has a rebellion received such advance publicity as Rhodesia's action in declaring independence from the United Kingdom unilaterally. In some circumstances, sanctions may be conceived as having no more than symbolic significance. The declared aim of UK government policy was to persuade Rhodesian whites to repent, or at least reform. For those who regarded Rhodesian whites as incorrigible racialists, incapable as well as unworthy of redemption, mere abandonment of independence was insufficient atonement for their sins.
