Politics

A common problem facing students of the economy of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is the shortage of available statistics. It is extremely challenging to procure DPRK data,…

Rocky roads conjure images of pitfalls and jarring bumps on a tortuous journey toward some desired destination, without assurance that some calamity will not bar the way to the hoped-for…

Between winning the election in December 2007 and taking office in February 2008, Lee Myungbak and his administration sketched out a massive reform program that would potentially affect every aspect…

North Korea’s economy has been on the verge of collapse since the beginning of the second nuclear crisis in 2002 because of the international community’s growing sanctions and pressure. The…

At the Asian Games this September, Team Korea didn’t just get a gold medal in the popular video game League of Legends. The team also received an exemption from active-duty conscription into the armed forces of Korea. Maintaining an adequate fighting force is a critical issue for Korea, not just because of its unruly neighbor…

Words and labels have power. They can frame the way we think, fortify assumptions, and build expectations. They also obfuscate and mislead. In academic, diplomatic and media settings, the routine descriptor to contextualize South Korea’s role in the world is “middle power.” We rarely think deeply about the term and are prone to ignore its…

Two decades ago, South Korea was rarely called a middle power. Today, it invites ridicule to suggest South Korea is anything but a middle power. Given the concept’s ambiguity and lackluster academic credentials, why did the definition become so widely applied? The immediate answer is obvious. South Korea started to be labeled a middle power…

With the final rule regarding the CHIPS Act guardrails released on September 22, Korean chipmakers’ ability to receive U.S. subsidies while maintaining operations in China appears to be on firmer footing.  Korean chipmakers had been caught in a form of limbo ever since the U.S. Department of Commerce released the proposed guardrails in March 2023,…