Presenting the Sanctionable Events Dataset
Thomas Kruiper · 2024
This chapter presents the Sanctionable Events Dataset (SED), a research tool that allows for the investigation of the selective nature of UN sanctions regimes. The dataset is different from existing datasets in one fundamental aspect. Rather than using sanctions regimes or episodes as a starting point , it uses them as an endpoint . Instead of measuring what happens after a sanction has been imposed, it asks what happened before it was mandated. It focuses on selectiveness , not effectiveness . First, the chapter explains what makes an event ‘sanctionable’. Subsequently, it provides a list of 7 nuclear proliferators outside of the NPT, 6 interstate wars since 1990, 76 civil wars since 1990, 136 terrorist organizations since 2000, and 42 successful coups d’état since 1990, creating a total of 267 sanctionable events, 70 (26%) of which received sanctions. Finally, the chapter provides a codebook consisting of several dozen variables, that serve as proxies for four main hypotheses about selectivity: Countervailing power, Westphalianism, Humanitarianism, and Western Bias.