Asia

South Korea is currently engaged, once again, in a large-scale, expensive modernization of its military that aims to provide the country with a more robust and self-sufficient defense. The timing…

Globalization is a hallmark of the twenty first-century world. As transportation and telecommunications grow in both efficiency and level of performance and as the ambit of the Internet expands, it…

The penetration of the Internet in Korean society is usually seen as a positive development, perhaps even a model for other countries; more efficient bureaucracy, more political figures making use…

In the field of international security, few connections have been made between the Korean peninsula with the Middle East. Traditional regional studies literature focuses on Korean issues within the Asia…

In this episode, Korean Kontext speaks with Ms. Jie-ae Sohn, President of Arirang TV & Radio, Korea’s first English language international broadcast system. Ms. Sohn worked as the former CNN…

Preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons has emerged to be one of the key foreign policy priorities of the Obama administration. Despite efforts among Western powers to form a united…

By the time you read this, the KORUS FTA will have entered the implementation stage. To celebrate, Korean Kontext caught up with two of the main movers-and-shakers behind the deal…

This episode of Korean Kontext has a distinctly British flavor, featuring interviews with two leading Ambassador’s that work closely on UK and Korea related affairs. While recently in London, Korean…

Labor market dualism – the segmentation between regular and non-regular workers -- is deeply entrenched in Korea’s labor market. Regular workers receive higher wages and social insurance coverage and a high degree of job security, while non-regular workers receive lower wages, are less likely to be covered by social insurance and work in precarious jobs.…

Last month was the fifth anniversary of North Korea's assassination of Kim Jong-nam using VX, a deadly nerve agent. On 13 February 2017, the half brother of Chairman Kim Jong-un was attacked by North Korean proxies in the Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia. Experts say that the deployment of a horrific weapon outside of…

In a previous post, we asked the question of whether the Korean electorate was becoming more polarized, looking at the ideological differences across all citizens and those who identified most strongly with the two major parties. Our findings were that politics was becoming somewhat more polarized, but more sharply among partisans than the general public.…

The New Southern Policy (NSP) is considered one of President Moon Jae-in’s signature foreign policies, along with the New Northern Policy (NNP). It was implemented in November 2017 shortly following his inauguration to foster stronger diplomatic and economic ties with Southeast Asia and India,[1] and consequently bolster South Korea’s independence in leading its foreign relations.…