The purpose of this article is to separate the question of whether sanctions "work" from that of whether they should be used and to identify appropriate concepts and methods for answering each question. Until researchers agree on which questions to ask and on how to seek answers, the sanctions debate is unlikely to produce useful policy-relevant knowledge. The discussion addresses the following topics: (1) the choice of economic sanctions; (2) the evaluation of economic sanctions; (3) sanctions and military force; (4) the methodological problems of selection bias, strategic interaction, counterfactuals, and symbolic behavior; and (5) the use of sanctions in the Gulf War.