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…

Although it is happening more rapidly in South Korea, an aging society is a common feature in post-industrial societies around the world. With the number of retirees growing and the…

In March, Seoul suffered from the worst air pollution on record. Enough that the South Korean government has officially designated the problem as a "social disaster." But what is causing…

Over the past few years, Korea and Koreans have experienced incredible political, social, and diplomatic shifts. It is hard keeping up with all these new developments as a Korea Watcher,…

Even before the meeting between President Trump and Kim Jong-un in Hanoi, foreign policy practitioners and observers were talking about the difficulties of sequencing international sanctions relief for North Korea…

By Ben Hancock It’s still unclear whether the rapid political shift underway in Burma can carry its momentum. Even the matter of what is truly driving its evolution seems to be guesswork at this point; and as the NYT’s Edward Wong reminds us, there is the minor matter of a seething rebellion in the Kachin…

By Sarah K. Yun For the first time in Korean politics, two women are leading the ruling and opposition parties.  Two other women became the chairpersons for the most liberal party in Korea.  In January 2012, Korea was accepted to chair the United Nations Women, which promotes gender equality and empowerment of women.  Also recently,…

By Yu, Byoung-gyu  The sudden death of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has increased uncertainty regarding the future of inter-Korean economic cooperation. The prospects for economic cooperation between the two Koreas can be considered from both short term and a medium to longer term perspectives. In the short term, deadlock on economic cooperation will likely…

By Nicholas Hamisevicz 2012 is a year of elections and leadership transitions in Asia. Taiwan was set to have the honor of kicking things off, but the death of Kim Jong-il in late December placed much of the early year’s attention on only the second transition in North Korea. In Taiwan, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)…