Most Popular
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Seoul transit pass for travelers to be available starting July
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Controversy rekindled over when to name criminals, suspects
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[Weekender] Pet food makers bet big on ‘recession-free’ pet food market
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N. Korea says to deploy new multiple rocket launcher starting this year
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[Drama Tour] Romantic trip to ‘Queen of Tears’ filming spots
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‘Monk’ DJ spreading Buddhism goes global
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Battery makers ramp up efforts to diversify graphite supply chain
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Hybe-Ador CEO conflict gets messier
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Buddha's birthday lantern parade to light up Seoul
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[LLG] Unseen inheritance: Trauma of transnational adoption 'trickles down' to adoptees' children
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[Robert S. McElvaine] Will 2022 turn the clock back to America before 1964?
“The United States is now at one of those historic forks in the road whose outcome will prove as fateful as those of the 1860s, the 1930s, and the 1960s,” Nancy MacLean wrote in her 2017 book, “Democracy in Chains.” History is punctuated by discontinuities that alter its trajectory. The key to the occurrence of such watershed moments is less the leaders than a sociopolitical environment that is receptive to change. The current inflection point has become much more appa
July 8, 2022
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[Contribution] Solving the Paradox in the Han River and the next generation’s right for a future (3)
The future of the Korean Peninsula in the 21st century is likely to be linked to events unfolding in North Korea, according to professor Andrei Lankov at Kookmin University. The North continues to be an existential threat to South Korea (and vice versa). Nearly 70 years of calm, and generations without memories of the war (or even links with the wartime generation), have largely numbed the collective consciousness about North Korea in the South. Public opinion polls today show that the majority
July 7, 2022
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[Lee Kyong-hee] Living on tears of invisible foreign workers
The female sea divers of Jeju are among the symbolic features of the southern island and admittedly its major tourist resource. The “haenyeo” and their age-old ocean harvesting skills are recognized by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Back in the 15th century, however, these stalwart women flabbergasted a new magistrate on his inspection tour by bravely jumping into the cold winter sea, wearing only outfits made of thin cotton. The tender-hearted magistrate hande
July 7, 2022
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[Martin Schram] Republicans, what do you see when you look in the mirror?
It is yet another morning after. But as you stare at your bathroom mirror, on this Wednesday morning after Tuesday’s hearing, it somehow feels as if you are staring at just another news screen. And this one just keeps looping more bad news you can’t bear to see. Like one-third of Americans, you’ve always been proud to call yourself one of our 45th president’s MAGA Trumpers. You are, of course, the face and politics of that person in your mirror. It is you, a proud Trump
July 6, 2022
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[Kim Seong-kon] Journey to the past through historical fiction
History is a mirror to the present. When something goes wrong in the present, we look back upon the past to see what went wrong earlier. Reading historical fiction, therefore, is a way of making a journey to the past to find out the origin of our present predicament. Oh Yoon-hee’s recently published historical novel, “The Eerie Story Club at Samgae Tavern & Inn, Book III” is a good example. Just like her previously published Book I and Book II of the same title, Book III
July 6, 2022
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[Trudy Rubin] NATO is united on Ukraine but still not doing what is necessary to deter Putin
When it comes to the NATO summit and President Joe Biden‘s performance as global leader, there’s the good news and the bad news. Confronted with the dangerous ambitions of Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, NATO appeared more unified than at any time since the Cold War. In fact, Russia‘s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine has effectively revived the Cold War. Most NATO members are upping their defense budgets and pledging to upgrade their forces. A new military doctrine will increase
July 5, 2022
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[Takatoshi Ito] America’s watery Indo-Pacific alphabet soup
In May, US President Joe Biden visited South Korea and Japan with the aim of reaffirming America’s commitment to the Asia-Pacific region after the uncertainties and doubts generated by Donald Trump’s presidency. In Tokyo, Biden launched the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity and participated in a summit of the Quad, an informal security grouping that also includes Japan, Australia, and India. The Quad aims to promote and secure a free, open, prosperous, and inclusive Ind
July 5, 2022
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[Antara Haldar] Trump’s lessons for defending the rule of law
A new show currently airing gives fresh meaning to the term reality TV. Call it “American Democracy: Clear and Present Danger.” It should be required viewing. Almost 18 months after the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the US Capitol, a House of Representatives select committee is publicizing the findings of its detailed investigation into the event. The committee has interviewed over 1,000 witnesses and examined 125,000 documents. It has held six hearings so far in June, with a view to tr
July 4, 2022
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[Robert J. Fouser] Taking the lead in renewable energy
The sharp rise in the price of oil over the past year is one of the primary causes of rising inflation around the world. The high cost of oil affects every sector of the economy, making it more expensive to produce and move goods at all points in the supply chain. As prices rise, workers require higher wages, which adds to inflationary pressure. Inflation affects lower income workers and retirees most because the increase in the cost of basic goods, such as food and transportation, often outpace
July 1, 2022
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[Contribution] Solving the paradox in the Han River and the next generation’s right for a future (2)
Last week, I introduced the paradox on the Han River: the rise of Korea’s global success and decline in hope among young Koreans. Here, I will continue to examine Korea’s choices around two pivotal areas facing the next generation -- its economic future and social inclusion. What choices will South Korea make to sustain its economic future? An explicit focus on economic growth, rather than focusing on distribution alone such as advocated by the “degrowth” movemen
June 30, 2022
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[Kim Myong-sik] Keeping North Korea at a controlled distance
Fifty days after the governing power changed in Seoul, the distance between the South and North on the Korean Peninsula clearly looks farther. New right-wing President Yoon Suk-yeol would bring to a close the reconciliatory course toward North Korea that the leftist administration of Moon Jae-in had taken for the past five years. The successful launch of a space rocket from a south coast cape last week was like a bonfire to celebrate the new presidency. It convinced ordinary people here that w
June 30, 2022
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[Kim Seong-kon] ‘You never know what you have until it’s gone’
There are things that we take for granted and thus do not appreciate until they are no longer there. In the restroom of Ground, a coffee shop in New London, New Hampshire, there is a sign that says, “You never know what you have until it’s gone. Toilet paper, for instance.” Indeed, we do not realize how important and indispensable it is to have toilet paper until it is gone. Of course, toilet paper is not alone in this. I know someone who has breathing problems due to severe
June 29, 2022
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[Zev Chafets] Biden’s risky trip to the Mideast is also pointless
President Joe Biden has a politically risky itinerary for his scheduled trip to Israel, the West Bank and Saudi Arabia in mid-July. The question is, why he is doing this? The tour is scheduled to begin in Jerusalem, where the president plans “to meet with Israeli leaders to discuss security, prosperity and increasing integration into the great region.” All worthy topics, but not quite in sync with the moment. On Monday, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett announced his resignation. Acco
June 28, 2022
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[Tyler Cowen] Beware the nested games of Russia’s war in Ukraine
“Beware the nested game.” It is one of the least-known but most useful adages to keep in mind when following international affairs, and it is especially relevant now that Lithuania has announced a blockade of sanctioned Russian goods. A nested game is what it sounds like -- a game within a game. It recognizes that the actors in most real-world settings are not unified and have conflicting motives. The classic example is the failure of a proposed Middle East peace deal because some h
June 24, 2022
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[Lee In-hyun] Mendelssohn’s music for summer night
To this day, I still vividly remember going to the Hollywood Bowl in the summer in Los Angeles. Since I majored in piano, when I think of summer, the first thing that comes to my mind are the kind of music festivals held in that venue. When I came to the United States for graduate school, I studied piano with deep sincerity. And part of that was going to various music camps and music festivals to learn more during my summer vacation. My favorites were the Aspen Music Festival and School in A
June 23, 2022
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[Alexander Schallenberg, Phil Twyford] The new urgency of nuclear disarmament
Austria and New Zealand may be far apart geographically, but we are connected by shared values and principles. Particularly relevant today is our longstanding opposition to nuclear weapons and our shared concern about the lack of progress on nuclear disarmament. While the threat of nuclear weapons never went away after the end of the Cold War, steep cuts to nuclear stockpiles in the early 1990s represented progress. But the trend toward disarmament stalled. Three decades on, nine nuclear-armed
June 23, 2022
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[Lee Kyong-hee] From chocolates to chips to nuclear warheads
This weekend, we’ll again recall the beginning of the Korean War. For me, it is also the start of my memories. Not yet 3 years old, I was too young to fully grasp the magnitude of the conflict and contextualize my memories. So, the upheaval that began on June 25, 1950 still remains a disjointed sequence of scenes. Among them: A sister went out when Seoul was in North Korean hands -- and never returned; without warning, an American soldier awakened my family, waving a flashlight in our si
June 23, 2022
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[Martin Schram] How a Watergate punishment might have averted our Jan. 6 hell
On June 17, Americans found ourselves at the convergence of two crises of shattering assaults on our democracy. They were crises of crimes and cover-ups, at opposite ends of history’s half-century arc. They were crimes committed by two very different sitting presidents -- Richard Nixon and Donald Trump -- who were determined to win reelection, no matter what. Both times, America’s true patriots faced challenges of proving the crimes and dealing with all wrongdoers so firmly that it
June 22, 2022
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[Kim Seong-kon] ’Where have all the soldiers gone?’
The 72nd anniversary of the Korean War is just around the corner, meaning that those born in the unforgettable year of 1950 are now 72 years old. It also means that few people in Korea will remember the war that utterly devastated the Korean Peninsula for three years or those who died in wartime. Americans call the Korean War the “forgotten war” because few people seem to remember it. For the Korean people, however, the Korean War must not be forgotten. Embarrassingly, we do not see
June 22, 2022
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[Contribution] Solving the paradox in the Han River and the next generation’s right for a future (1)
“The Miracle on the Han River” has been often used to describe South Korea’s rise and leapfrogging from one of the world’s poorest countries in 1950s to one of the richest today. In a single generation, Korea became a leader in technological innovation with global brands such as Samsung going head-to-head with Apple and other major companies. From “Squid Game” to Blackpink, Korean dramas, movies and music are showing no signs of slowing down, breaking new gro
June 21, 2022