抄録
This article briefly discusses the social function of sanctions from the perspective of economics, as well as examining the merits and demerits of "collective sanctions", systems where punishments (or rewards) extend not only to a deviator but to other persons who belong to the deviator's group.
The major merit of collective sanctions lies in delegating the control of a group to people within the group, mobilizing informal sanctions, and stimulating the group to create new norms. The effect of a collective sanction, however, depends on the structure of the target group. Moreover, the possibility should be considered that the structure of a group might be transformed by collective sanctions.
In the real world most of sanctions have externalities, so there is continuum between sanctions that target a single individual and collective sanctions. Therefore, the analysis might hold for virtually all sanctions to a greater or lesser degree.
