Asia

Why is South Korea pilot-testing its Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), and what made it shift from non-issuance to consideration? This paper investigates the Bank of Korea (BOK)’s CBDC-related developments…

How is the increasing spread of artificial intelligence (AI) likely to shape the cyber capabilities of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK; North Korea) in the coming years? Over…

In this new article of KEI’s Korea’s Economy,  Dr. Bark Taeho (President of the Global Commerce Institute of Lee & Ko and Former Minister for Trade) notes that Korea has faced…

The COVID-19 pandemic caught almost all countries unprepared. Some countries, including South Korea (hereafter Korea), managed to deal with the pandemic relatively more successfully than others and had a proactive…

With worldwide familiarity of Korean pop culture increasing through the viral exposure of Korean musician Psy’s hit record “Gangnam Style”, this episode Korean Kontext speaks to Mark James Russell, author…

In this episode we spoke to B.R. Myers, author of “The Cleanest Race” and regular contributor to the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Atlantic.  Having been raised…

In this interview Korea Kontext speaks with Dr. Jennifer Lind, assistant professor at the Department of Government, Dartmouth College.  Well known for her work on North Korea and N.E. Asia…

In this episode we spoke to comedian and actor Steven Byrne, of the brand new TBS series “Sullivan and Sons”.  Known as one of the hardest working and energetic comics in…

By Gi-Wook Shin, David Straub, and Joyce Lee The already serious situation on the Korean Peninsula is worsening. North Korea is on a path to credibly threaten South Korea, Japan, U.S. forces in Northeast Asia, and eventually the United States with a nuclear attack. At the same time, Inter-Korean relations have become dangerously unstable, with…

By Nicholas Hamisevicz From the Hack North Korea contest to smuggling in USBs and launching balloons over the DMZ, there have been many ways people have tried to get outside information to the North Korean people. Recently, an effective strategy was simply to have a powerful wireless Internet signal that anyone can access. This move,…

By Troy Stangarone On September 23, South Korean President Park Geun-hye and more than 120 world leaders attended the United Nations Climate Summit in New York during the annual opening of the General Assembly. The summit, held as a prelude to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris next year where world leaders hope…

This is the second in a 2 part series looking at the North Korea Sanctions Enforcement Act of 2014 (H.R. 1771). The first piece is available here. By Stephan Haggard To date, U.S. sanctions on North Korea have had both a strategic and defensive purpose. The strategic aim is to sharpen the choices Pyongyang faces…