Politics

This is the full PDF of the 2016 edition of Joint U.S.-Korea Academic Studies. Please click here to download the individual chapters included in this publication. Since our founding in…

What equilibrium means to geopolitical balance of power maneuvering, equality means to national identity resentments over gaps perceived as unjust. When South Korea gained favor as the “linchpin” of U.S.…

South Korea’s nation-building project during the Cold War relied heavily on strong state direction designed to generate a sense of cohesion and national identity. These strategies were conceived and executed…

It is tempting to see in developments in contemporary Japanese politics indications of a fundamental shift in Japanese national identity. Resist that temptation. There are changes afoot in Tokyo, but…

In the 2022 presidential election, the conservative opposition candidate Yoon Suk-yeol won the race with a 0.8% margin. During the campaign, Yoon received endorsements from five former senior military officers who had served in the Moon administration. They attributed the endorsement to “[their] faith in Yoon’s national security policies,” including his controversial remark that Seoul…

In December 2021, Yoon Suk-yeol’s campaign released a short candidate clip. Looking and sounding just like the candidate, the ‘man’ in the video says, “hello, it’s ‘AI Yoon Suk-yeol,’ are you surprised at how much I look like [him]?”  Since then, the campaign would go on to release short clips of the candidate responding to…

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.…

What Happened Merger talks between two opposition candidates, Ahn Cheol-soo and Yoon Seok-yeol, broke down. A recent poll suggests Yoon is still leading the race overall despite the merger falling apart. However, Yoon’s lead is within the margin of error and the merger with Ahn would have more safely secured his position. Implication: Hyperpolarization among…