Asia

This paper examines policies in the renewables sector across various countries and where political tensions could generate suboptimal outcomes for the sector’s development. In its analysis of supply- and demand-side…

With North Korea becoming increasingly politically isolated, there are few channels through which the international community can remain engaged. Despite the distaste most have for Pyongyang politics, more than 24…

This paper compares Sino–South Korean management of bilateral economic and political tensions; it argues that China’s WTO entry has provided an external institutional framework for managing disputes on the economic…

On 19 December 2003, the leader of Libya, Col. Muammar El-Qaddafi, shocked the world by abruptly stating that his country was renouncing its attempts to develop weapons of mass destruction…

This week, we have a very special guest who flew in from Paris to talk about Korea's economy. Dr. Randall Jones is head of the Japan/Korea Desk at the Organization…

As Seoul has grown, it has become more and more international. The city has been making an effort to attract more foreign visitors, whether as tourists, students or workers. This…

Over the last 50 years, Myanmar has oscillated between periods of friendship with South Korea and partnership with North Korea. As Myanmar opens to the international community, however, investment and…

Anyone who has spent time in Korea knows the term Yellow Dust. Sand from Mongolia sweeps across China, picking up pollutants and carrying them across borders. Every spring, Koreans bring…

The Ukraine accounts for 11.8% of the world’s wheat market and has long been known as the “breadbasket of Europe.” However, the potential outbreak of conflict between Russia and the Ukraine has implications for Ukraine’s wheat trade with all nations, including South Korea. The Ukraine is the 2nd largest exporter of wheat to South Korea,…

North Korea’s Supreme People’s Assembly, the country’s parliament, adopted the government budget for the new year at its session February 6-7.  The budget law was approved with a pledge to develop the economy and improve the people’s wellbeing despite the “persevering struggle” against international sanctions and the COVID pandemic. A particularly noteworthy aspect of the…

This post was revised on August 21 , 2023 to reflect additional research by the authors. Additional analysis can be found in authors' article Political Polarization in Korea. Korea’s democracy is clearly a success story. Along with Taiwan, it is one of the few Asian countries that transitioned to democratic rule in the 1980s and…

One of the most prominent policy and social problems plaguing the Republic of Korea today is a declining birth rate. The nation fell below the replacement fertility rate of 2.1 in 1983 and rested at 0.84 at the end of 2020. This sustained decline has negative implications for economic growth in the long run as…