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…

For understandable reasons, the international community has been focused on North Korea's nuclear program, concerned that Pyongyang could have a weapon capable of such massive destruction. But should they also…

Last week, we looked at the details of the new US and UN sanctions against North Korea, delving into the new measures to get at Pyongyang's funding. But will they…

On February 18, President Barack Obama signed into law a new round of sanctions designed to further squeeze the North Korean regime. On March 3, the United Nations Security Council…

Human rights in North Korea remains a divisive issue between the international community and North Korea. In 2013, the United Nations Human Rights Council established Commission of Inquiry on Human…

Last Thursday, Korean chipmaker SK Hynix made history by developing a 10-nanometer (nm) transistor process for 16 GB Double Data Rate 5 (DDR5), the latest iteration of dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) chips. By allowing for greater memory capacity and processing speeds for the corresponding central processing units (CPUs) that are used for cloud computation, this…

“You can either buy clothes or buy pictures.” (Gertrude Stein) The air will be filled with a different kind of buzz in Seoul this week as it hosts the third annual international art fair, Frieze Seoul. Over 110 leading art galleries worldwide will assemble for four days at the COEX Convention and Exhibition Center in…

The public sector financed 76 percent of healthcare in OECD countries in 2021 using compulsory health insurance and government programs (Figure 1, Panel A). Korea is an outlier in this regard, as only 62.3 percent of its health expenditures were covered through mandatory financing schemes. The low share of mandatory financing in Korea was offset…

The overwhelming majority of refugees who flee North Korea are generally those who live in border areas adjacent to China and do not have prominent government or economic positions. Few are from Pyongyang because it is very difficult for citizens to travel within the country unless police and internal security officials approve the travel. Meanwhile,…