Most Popular
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Korea’s homegrown nanosatellite successfully launches into space
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Ador CEO denies allegations, accuses Hybe of mistreating NewJeans
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[Herald Interview] 'Amid aging population, Korea to invite more young professionals from overseas'
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Nicaragua shuts down Seoul embassy
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Hybe's multilabel system tested amid conflict with Ador
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Rocket engine expert, ex-NASA exec to lead Korea's new space agency
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SNU profs to suspend treatment for one day
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SK hynix pledges W20tr to ramp up DRAM production at home
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Over-50s, men, single-person households take up majority of those filing for bankruptcy
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Medical reform committee kicks off despite boycott from doctors
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[Kim Seong-kon] Ex-presidents and looking at things upside down
A few days ago, I went to the Korea National Diplomatic Academy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to give a lecture on American culture to high-ranking government officials. Walking toward the lecture hall, I saw a huge world atlas hanging on the wall. Interestingly, the map was upside down, so Australia was up above and Russia was down under. The unconventional map provided me with a whole new perspective of perceiving the world. Below the map was an intriguing caption: “Looking at the world u
April 8, 2014
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How to unlock Africa’s economic potential
In the past year, I’ve visited Nigeria three times ― more than I’ve traveled to any other country except the U.S. I mentioned this to an audience on my most recent trip, saying I wasn’t sure what it meant: Am I a leading, coincident or lagging indicator? Maybe I was just there for the power outages ― they shield me from the latest news about Manchester United. (Don’t ask.)Of course I aspire to be a leading indicator ― and I’m hopeful Nigeria and much of the rest of Africa will demonstrate my far
April 8, 2014
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[Yuliya Tymoshenko] Resisting Yalta temptation
KIEV ― The quiet period between the declaration of war in September 1939 and the Nazi blitz on Belgium and France in May 1940 is often called “The Phony War.” Since Russia invaded and annexed Crimea, and began massing troops and armored columns on our eastern border, we in Ukraine have been living through a “phony peace.”There is nothing phony, however, about the efforts we Ukrainians are now making to defend our country and our democracy. Our young men and women are volunteering for military se
April 7, 2014
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Putin’s rejection of the West, in writing
What kind of country is Vladimir Putin’s Russia? The third year of his third presidential term has offered plenty of clues: the Crimea invasion, the shuttering of uncensored media outlets, prison terms for protesters. Now, Putin is planning to put the intellectual and ideological foundations of the new regime into words.A document called “Foundations of the State Cultural Policy” has been under development since 2012. A special working group under Putin’s chief of staff Sergei Ivanov will soon r
April 7, 2014
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India’s voters deserve a better kind of politics
The elections that begin Monday in India and unfold over the following weeks will be unusually significant. It isn’t just that they’ll decide whether the controversial chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi, will assume leadership of almost a fifth of humanity. The vote also marks a deep and potentially momentous change in the character of the Indian electorate.Unlike in previous polls, when huge blocks of voters could be counted on to support dubiously qualified candidates of their own caste
April 7, 2014
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[Joseph E. Stiglitz] Reforming state-market balance in China
BEIJING ― No country in recorded history has grown as fast ― and moved as many people out of poverty ― as China over the last thirty years. A hallmark of China’s success has been its leaders’ willingness to revise the country’s economic model when and as needed, despite opposition from powerful vested interests. And now, as China implements another series of fundamental reforms, such interests are already lining up to resist. Can the reformers triumph again?In answering that question, the crucia
April 7, 2014
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Scare tactics fail climate scientists, and everyone else
Why aren’t climate scientists winning the argument on climate policy? It sure isn’t for lack of effort.The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change just published another vast pile of material, this time focused on “impacts, adaptation and vulnerability.” The IPCC says that the new report’s “30 chapters, supported by a number of annexes and supplementary material” were produced by a “total of 243 Coordinating and Lead Authors and 66 review editors from 70 countries and 436 Contributing Authors
April 7, 2014
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[Robert Reich] Slouching toward oligarchy
America is not yet an oligarchy, but that’s where Charles and David Koch and a few other billionaires are taking us.American democracy used to depend on political parties that more or less represented most of us. Political scientists of the 1950s and 1960s marveled at American “pluralism,” by which they meant the capacities of parties and other membership groups to reflect the preferences of the vast majority of citizens.Then around a quarter century ago, as income and wealth began concentrating
April 6, 2014
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What Xi Jinping could learn from pope
Xi Jinping and Jorge Mario Bergoglio would seem like natural enemies. The Chinese president runs a government that squashes religious freedom, limits procreation and has a dismal human-rights record. Bergoglio ― better known as Pope Francis ― wants access to Xi’s many citizens in order to spread the Catholic Church’s teachings, challenge the Communist Party’s hold on dogma and even reach out to North Korea.Yet these world leaders should really be sharing notes. The tasks facing the two men who t
April 6, 2014
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[Yu Kun-ha] Time to end life support for zombie firms
Economists have shown that one way to spur productivity growth of an industrial sector is to clear it of “zombies” ― unproductive and unprofitable companies that need support from their creditors or the government to stay afloat. These nonviable firms hinder a more efficient allocation of resources. By continuing to operate, they use up financial, physical and human resources that could be allocated to more productive companies.Furthermore, they depress economic activity by making it difficult f
April 6, 2014
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Home run hitters of the U.S. Supreme Court
In the nation’s history, 112 people have served on the Supreme Court of the United States. Suppose that we were to select the all-time greats. Who would make the cut?To answer that question, we need a metric. It makes sense to consider two factors: historical significance and legal ability. It would be too contentious to include only those justices with whom one agrees, so let’s make this list ideology-free. We’ll also exclude the current justices, because it is too early to tell whether any wil
April 6, 2014
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Korea champions global safe cities campaign
Nine years after the United Nations’ General Assembly endorsed the Hyogo Framework for Action to reduce disaster losses the world is making progress in building more resilient communities, cities and nations.The Republic of Korea should be proud of its significant contributions to this global effort. The country’s National Emergency Management Agency has emerged as a leading advocate of stronger disaster risk management to protect and sustain the huge development gains of recent years.NEMA, alon
April 6, 2014
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[J. Bradford DeLong] Marx and Mechanical Turk
BERKELEY, California ― The economist Suresh Naidu once remarked to me that there were three big problems with Karl Marx’s economics. First, Marx thought that increased investment and capital accumulation diminished labor’s value to employers and thus diminished workers’ bargaining power. Second, he could not fully grasp that rising real material living standards for the working class might well go hand in hand with a rising rate of exploitation ― that is, a smaller income share for labor. And, t
April 4, 2014
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Putin is ‘wild’ while West is ‘wary’
VIENNA ― The West is now living in Putin’s world. It is there not because Putin is right, or even because he is stronger, but because he is taking the initiative. Putin is “wild” while the West is “wary.” While European and American leaders recognize that the world order is undergoing a dramatic change, they cannot quite grasp it. They remain overwhelmed by Putin’s transformation from CEO of Russia, Inc., into an ideology-fueled national leader who will stop at nothing to restore his country’s i
April 4, 2014
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[T.V. Paul] South Asia’s peace spoilers
MONTREAL ― Long-anticipated peace negotiations between India and Pakistan appear to have been delayed until after India’s May parliamentary elections, and the prospects for subsequent talks are not clear. Victory for Narendra Modi’s nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, a resurgent Taliban in the wake of the United States’ impending troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, and Pakistan’s continuing failure to negotiate with or suppress the Pakistani Taliban, point to a period of intense uncertainty and
April 3, 2014
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Is Xi Jinping determined to catch the ‘tigers’?
It’s great that China’s President Xi Jinping is pouncing on ex-security chief Zhou Yongkang. By seizing assets worth an estimated $14.5 billion and launching the biggest corruption probe in modern history, Xi is showing he’s serious about curbing the excesses imperiling China’s future. Right?That’s one possible upshot of the Reuters scoop sending shockwaves through Beijing. The other: It’s politics as usual, retribution against a man who irked the establishment by opposing last year’s takedown o
April 3, 2014
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Indonesia’s foreign policy and the election
Many are pondering who to place their hopes in for a better Indonesia at the upcoming polls. The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle’s recently nominated Jakarta Gov. Joko “Jokowi” Widodo as its presidential candidate. All assumptions about him must still be tested until a leader is elected.Those who criticize the nomination argue Jokowi should finish his term as governor before taking on the more difficult and challenging task of the presidency. Many say Jokowi is simply benefiting from his
April 3, 2014
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Myanmar’s flawed census discounts chance for peace
Myanmar’s government claims its first national census in three decades will bring about reconciliation in a country rife with religious and ethnic tensions. But the survey, which began on Sunday, appears more likely to intensify the divisions among communities.Conducting a census is a normal process for any government. It provides vital demographic information on the size of the population, its different ethnic and religious groups, how they live and how well they live. States routinely use this
April 3, 2014
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[Jonathan Eyal] Why crisis in faraway Ukraine matters to Asia
China’s diplomats have every reason to feel satisfied with their handling of the Ukraine crisis.On the one hand, China expressed its support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity, an implicit rebuke to Russia, which seized Ukraine’s Crimea region.But at the same time, Beijing has abstained from all anti-Russian votes at the United Nations, and let it be known that it won’t be supporting anti-Russian sanctions.Beijing’s determination to have its cake and eat it, to be caught neither on Russia’s sid
April 3, 2014
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[David Ignatius] U.S. may expand Syrian aid
WASHINGTON ― The Obama administration, stung by reversals in Ukraine and Syria, appears to have decided to expand its covert program of training and assistance for the Syrian opposition, deepening U.S. involvement in that brutal and stalemated civil war.The White House announced that President Obama discussed “the crisis in Syria” along with other subjects when he met Friday in Riyadh with Saudi King Abdullah, but the statement didn’t mention any details of the stepped-up Syria assistance progra
April 2, 2014