DODGING ECONOMIC ISOLATION: THE ASYMMETRIC IMPACT OF WESTERN SANCTIONS ON BELARUS

David Zehner

No 152, University of Tartu - Faculty of Economics and Business Administration Working Paper Series from Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, University of Tartu (Estonia)

Abstract: This paper assesses the economic consequences of targeted Western sanctions on Belarus following the 2020 post-election crackdown. This study analyses aggregate exports alongside a specific focus on potash, a vital state revenue engine where Belarus commands 20% of global production, making it a sensitive global commodity. Utilising a Difference-in-Differences (DiD) framework and complemented by Synthetic Control Methods (SCM), the study evaluates bilateral trade flows from 2015 to 2021. The results reveal a structural asymmetry, where the initial economic shock caused a 48.5% contraction in Belarus’s aggregate exports relative to a post-Soviet control group, and potash exports remained insulated, yielding an insignificant coefficient of 0.000 relative to global peers. This divergence suggests that while comprehensive measures disrupted aggregate trade, targeted sectoral sanctions faced enforcement limits. This study contributes to literature on sanction circumvention in integrated regional markets.

Keywords: sanction effectiveness; trade circumvention; Belarus; potash sector; Difference-in-Differences (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 33 pages
Date: 2026
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://mjtoimetised.ut.ee/febpdf/febawb152.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mtk:febawb:152

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in University of Tartu - Faculty of Economics and Business Administration Working Paper Series from Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, University of Tartu (Estonia) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Liis Roosaar ().