SanctionsApp is a tool that can be used by both scholars and practitioners who have an interest in examining, or who are working on designing and implementing UN targeted sanctions. SanctionsApp was developed based on the research findings of the Targeted Sanctions Consortium (TSC) research project - the first comprehensive, systematic, and comparative assessment of the impacts and effectiveness of all UN targeted sanctions regimes since 1991 undertaken by more than fifty scholars and policy practitioners worldwide.

The TSC project research findings are presented in five core functions on SanctionsApp:

(1) Sanctions Menu provides sample text for different types of UN targeted sanctions, drawing on language used previously by the Security Council. In this function of the app, different types of targeted sanctions are presented on a scale ranging from most targeted to least targeted.

(2) Cases & Episodes presents a detailed qualitative overview and analysis of 65 different episodes within all 22 UN targeted sanctions regimes, including assessments of their effectiveness and links to relevant UN resolutions.

(3) Analogy Finder identifies for policy practitioners the most appropriate analogies to contemporary conflict situations, enabling them to enter key characteristics of the threat (such as the type of conflict), the purposes of the targeted sanctions (whether to coerce, constrain, and/or signal), and examples of effective sanctions regimes in the past.

(4) Sanctions Checklist presents a quick overview of factors that should be considered when designing targeted sanctions.

SanctionsApp was developed at the Graduate Institute, Geneva, with the support of the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs. It was produced by the TSC’s co-directors, Thomas Biersteker and Sue Eckert, and by Marcos Tourinho and Zuzana Hudáková, with extensive assistance from Cecilia Cannon. The App was designed and programmed by Colaco SA. Neither the Graduate Institute, the Government of Switzerland, nor the App designer bear any responsibility for the assessments of effectiveness of UN targeted sanctions contained in the App, or other App content, which are the sole responsibility and intellectual property of the content developers.

SanctionsApp is updated on a regular basis, and the assessments of effectiveness in Version 1.0 date from 1 January 2013. For comments or questions, please contact sanctionsapp@gmail.com. For more information about the TSC research project see the TSC website:
http://graduateinstitute.ch/internationalgovernance/UN_Targeted_Sanctions.html

To cite SanctionsApp, please use the following format: Biersteker, Thomas and Sue Eckert, Zuzana Hudakova, and Marcos Tourinho, SanctionsApp, Computer software, Apple App Store, 21 June 2013.