North America

Long before BTS and Psy made their debut, a handful of entrepreneurs were laying the foundations for what would become the Korean Wave in the United States. With Korean pop culture…

Korea today leads the world in autos and electronics, but newly emerging manufacturers and protectionism threaten the country's position as a leading exporter. In search of innovative industries that will…

K-pop had an explosive year in 2018, but it didn't arise from a vacuum. Since 1998, one web community – Soompi – has been sharing the latest information about Korea's…

For the latest episode, Korean Kontext spoke to Korean-American actor James Kyson. Having made waves for his performance as Japanese character Ando Masahashi on hit NBC television series “Heroes”, Korean Kontext…

KEI’s 2021 Report on American Attitudes on the U.S.-ROK Alliance and North Korea Policy summarizes results from a survey commissioned by KEI and conducted by YouGov on May 6th to…

This paper addresses the U.S.-South Korea alliance in the context of Asia’s evolving security architecture. At the crux of the issue is the Biden administration’s desire to uphold the rules-based…

The Korea Economic Institute of America (KEI), with the generous support of the Korea Foundation, organized six “Vision Group” roundtable conversations with leading American scholars and commentators to discuss the…

Commentators have pointed to the “Trump Effect” for falling international student enrollment in the U.S. higher education sector. When taking a closer look at student mobility trends from South Korea,…

Political Junkies and anxious U.S. citizens watched in awe last week as the United States House of Representatives put on a five-day spectacle of electing the new Speaker of the House.  This surrealistic extravaganza finally concluded with the 15th vote which took place after midnight on January 7th. The election of the Speaker is usually…

This is the seventh piece in a series looking at how the issues identified in KEI’s annual “10 Issues to Watch for on the Korean Peninsula” series and other issues of note developed in 2022. The original “10 Issues” piece can be found here. In 2022, the United States and South Korea marked the 10th anniversary…

This is the fifth piece in a series looking at how the issues identified in KEI’s annual “10 Issues to Watch for on the Korean Peninsula” series and other issues of note developed in 2022. The original “10 Issues” piece can be found here. As Korea and China celebrated the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relations…

On August 9th, President Biden signed the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act to boost U.S. investment in the semiconductor industry and incentivize domestic manufacturers. Some of its major provisions incentivize investment in the United States by major foreign chip manufacturers, namely those from Taiwan and South Korea. Framed as a…