Sanction

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Sanction, which exists both as a verb and a noun, can be a confusing term. Its ambiguity comes from having two opposed meanings: 'to permit' (or 'a law [which permits]') and 'to punish' (or 'a punishment'). The word is derived from Latin, where it meant 'a law' or 'ordinance', specifically one declaring that something should not be touched: its oldest meaning is 'something made sacred' - or 'something declared to be untouchable'.

  • As a noun, the word is first recorded in English in the sixteenth century (OED), when it meant
    • 'a law', particularly 'a law, or rule, of the church'. In the following century, it developed to mean
    • "The specific penalty enacted in order to enforce obedience to a law" (OED, meaning 2.a). (This has sometimes included rewards for behaving well, as well as punishments for behaving badly.)
    • In the twentieth century, sanctions (most often in the plural) has come to have a third meaning: 'the actions taken by one state (short of full-scale war) to make another state do what the first state wants'. Such sanctions can be economic, as in trade embargoes, boycotts and various restrictions of trade, or military, usually short of full war, such as naval blockades or banning aerial flights.
    • Similarly, but on a more individual level, there can be ethical sanctions. An ethical sanction is "a consideration which operates to enforce obedience to any law or rule of conduct; a recognized motive for conformity to moral or religious law, operating either through the agent's desire for some resultant good or through his fear of some resultant evil" (OED, 3).
  • As a verb, 'to sanction' (first used in the eighteenth century) meant, first
    • 'to ratify or confirm', which soon grew into
    • 'to give authority to', 'to make legal' or 'to permit [by law]'; "in looser use, to countenance, encourage by express or implied approval" (OED). In the following century, this became
    • 'to lay down the penalty for disobeying, or breaking, the law'; and in the twentieth, in what Robert Burchfield, editor of OED called a "use of doubtful acceptability at present": "To impose sanctions upon (a person), to penalize."
For other words that have two apparently directly opposing meanings, see cleave and, more archaically, Splice.