November - December 2025

The Asan Forum > South Korea

South Korea

Select the date
February 7, 2019 Country Reports
Country Report: Russia (January 2019)

Sino-Russian relations remain the bedrock of Moscow’s Asia policy, as reaffirmed by when the Russian ambassador to China recounted at the start of 2019 how relations had been […]

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Olga Puzanova)

BRI, EEU, G20, Greater Eurasia, INF Treaty, SCO, Trump-Kim summit, turn to the East
January 31, 2019 Country Reports
Country Report: South Korea (January 2019)

The end of 2018 and the first weeks of 2019 saw the South Korean media obsessed with North Korea and its diplomacy with the United States and China. […]

Kim Kimberly

G20, Panmunjom Declaration, Pyongyang Declaration, Trump-Kim summit, Xi-Kim summit
December 30, 2018 Alternative Scenarios
Negative Scenario II

In his own words, President Moon Jae-in’s plan “is to make enough progress by the year’s end so the [peace] process cannot be reversed,” such that “there can […]

Kathryn Botto

Donald Trump, Kim Jong-un, Moon Jae-in, Pyongyang summit, Singapore Summit
December 30, 2018 Alternative Scenarios
Positive Scenario II

Months have passed since the Pyongyang summit—and hopes for a diplomatic breakthrough remain illusory. For a brief moment, the stalled diplomacy between Washington and Pyongyang appeared to recover; […]

Eun A Jo

Donald Trump, Kim Jong-un, Moon Jae-in, Moonshine Policy, Pyongyang summit, Singapore Summit
December 27, 2018 Country Reports
Country Report: Japan (December 2018)

The last part of 2018 was marked by the hopeful aftermath of the Abe-Xi summit and the new push by Abe and Putin to resolve the long-lingering dispute […]

Editorial Staff

"Belt and Road" Initiative, America First, APEC, East Asia Summit, free and open Indo-Pacific, Korea boom, Tokyo Strategy 2018
December 21, 2018 National Commentaries
A Japanese Perspective

What Do the Midterm Elections Mean for Trump’s East Asia Policies? The 2018 midterm elections have revealed that President Trump has only Plan A for his reelection campaign […]

Akimoto Satohiro

America First, free and open Indo-Pacific, Meng Wanzhou, Singapore Summit
December 20, 2018 Special Forum
Introduction

The history of East Asian democratization has been cast in terms of negative Confucian heritage, postwar US encouragement to allies, and the positive spillover of economic “miracles.” Focused […]

Gilbert Rozman

Constitutionalism, democratization, imperialism, nationalism
December 20, 2018 Special Forum
China’s Political Trajectory and Foreign Relations under the Influence of National Identity

Since Xi Jinping formally ascended to power in 2013, China has been flaunting its superior “China Model” to the rest of the world more actively than ever before. […]

Yinan He

"Belt and Road" Initiative, anti-Manchuism, Charm offensive, China Model, hard authoritarianism, Hate America Campaign
December 20, 2018 Special Forum
Democracy is More than a Political System: Lessons from South Korea’s Democratic Transformation

An assessment of South Korea’s democratization requires acknowledging juxtaposing patterns. On the one hand, the shadow of an authoritarian, Cold War state hangs over the country’s politics. State-society […]

Erik Mobrand

April Revolution, Candlelight Movement, Conservative democratization, De-authoritarianization, Kwangju Uprising, National Security Law
December 20, 2018 Special Forum
National Identity and Democracy: Lessons from the Case of Japan

The relationship between national identity and democracy is a complicated one. National identity provides a foundation for democratic politics in at least two senses. First, the spread of […]

Tadashi Anno

Asianism, Imperial restoration, Meiji Constitution, peace diplomacy, Taisho democracy