Inspired by the increased interest in economic sanctions and their consequences, this special issue contains a collection of studies by experts aiming to reflect the recent developments and trends in the literature on economic sanctions. The contributions contain theoretical research on the topic, data collection, and empirical work on the impact, effectiveness and success of sanctions. Moreover, the contributions come from economists and political scientists and are, therefore, interdisciplinary in nature. In this introduction, we highlight each paper in the volume by summarizing its salient features and by placing them in the broader context of the literature on economic sanctions. We also synthesize several takeaways and conclude by identifying questions we believe future research should shed further light on.