GIGA Sanctions Dataset: UN, US, and EU Sanctions on Authoritarian Regimes, 1990-2010

The entire universe of sanctions regimes imposed by the UN, US, and EU from 1990 to 2010, including those ongoing. It targets countries, leadership, and associated entities in at least 58 countries coded as authoritarian regimes. The dataset was created by Clara Portela and is available under a CC-BY-4.0 license.

Use Cases

• Analyzing the frequency and targets of sanctions based on the list of 58+ sanctioned countries.
• Studying the temporal evolution of sanctions regimes based on the 1990-2010 coverage period.
• Comparing sanctioning bodies (UN, US, EU) based on the described universe of imposed regimes.
• Researching the relationship between authoritarian governance and international sanctions based on the regime-type coding criteria.

Strengths

• Covers the complete universe of sanctions from three major bodies (UN, US, EU) for a defined period.
• Includes sanctions on at least 58 specific countries and territories, providing clear geographic scope.
• Explicitly codes target countries as authoritarian regimes using an established external dataset.

Limitations

• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• The data collection period ended in 2010, limiting analysis of recent sanctions.

Provenance

Source

Clara Portela via figshare.

Collection Method

Compilation of sanctions regimes from UN, US, and EU sources, cross-referenced with the Hadenius/Teorell/Wahman dataset on authoritarian regimes.

Time Range

1990 to 2010

Freshness

Last updated 2026-05-22 10:50:25; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, China, Colombia, Comoros, Côte d'Ivoire, Croatia, Cuba, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gambia, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Honduras, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kenya, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, North Macedonia, Malawi, Mauritania, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Peru, Russia, Rwanda, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, Thailand, Togo, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.