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This interview with APARC and Korea Program Director Gi-Wook Shin was originally published in Asia Experts Forum, a student-curated journal from the Keck Center for International and Strategic Studies at Claremont McKenna College. Ava Liao, a student journalist pursuing a dual major in International Relations and Media Studies, reported this story.



While Korean national identity was historically defined against Japanese imperialism, in more recent times Korean identity is responding to new influences related to globalization. How has Korean national identity been shaped by the distinctly Korean policy of segyehwa in the face of globalization?

Japanese colonialism was instrumental to the formation of Korean national identity. The Korean peninsula is surrounded by big powers such as China, Japan, and Russia. Even today, these influences are still very strong. A sense of threat is still there. Furthermore, although Korea is divided into North and South, Koreans share a strong sense of ethnic unity. Both North and South Koreans believe that they belong to a single nation, ethnicity, and race. For Koreans, this conflation of nation, ethnicity and race emphasizes the idea that there is a single bloodline going back to Dangun, a common ancestor and the mythic founder of the Korean nation. Even though they are divided, both sides believe that it is unnatural and only temporary and that they will eventually be reunified. 

Korea is very homogeneous; only about five percent of the population is non-ethnic Korean. The issue of maintaining social cohesion in the face of a growing power of globalization ironically strengthens ethnic identity. South Korea is trying to promote Korean culture on the world stage. Look at BTS, for example, and Parasite. Korean culture becoming popular around the world is fairly new and Koreans are really proud of that. The economy has grown greatly, it is a G20 country, and South Korea is proud of exporting its culture so successfully. With globalization, there have also been further efforts to absorb the overseas Korean population into the Korean identity and to utilize them as representatives in their host or resident countries. All these interrelated factors shape Korean national identity.

Your 2012 article “Racist South Korea? Diverse but Not Tolerant of Diversity,” concludes that although South Korea has become multi-ethnic, it has yet to become multicultural. It also outlines how foreigners, migrant workers of Korean ethnicity, and those with darker skin color often face discrimination in South Korea. Have these dynamics changed significantly since 2012?

Not so much. South Korea has been promoting multiculturalism as a policy initiative since 2006, so it is a fairly new phenomenon in Korean society. Foreign brides—from China, Vietnam, and other countries—marry Korean men and move to South Korea. They make contributions to the reproduction of the nation, which has an aging population and a low birth rate. It becomes a question of how to assimilate, and how these foreign brides can be integrated into Korean society. Even though the rhetoric is inclusive, in reality it is not very much so. Foreign brides are taught to assimilate into Korean culture and society, for example, by learning the Korean language, how to make kimchi, and how to respect the elderly. Another respect is in migrant labor, especially unskilled workers from developing countries. They are basically on a temporary visa, have little legal protection, and face a great deal of discrimination. Lower-class ethnic Koreans from China and North Korean defectors are also looked down upon, even if they belong to the same Korean nation. There is a gap between perception and reality. While they are told that they belong to the same nation and ethnicity, in reality, what really matters is class. Class matters much more than ethnicity, nationality, or even citizenship in practice. Foreign brides, migrant workers, and North Korean defectors are treated much poorly in South Korea than say, middle-class Korean-Americans or professionals from developed countries.

Your article also features Park No-Ja’s argument that colorism and white supremacy are inextricably linked in South Korean society. Why is this phenomenon prevalent across East Asia and Southeast Asia?

It reflects the reality of who has power in the world. If you refer back to history, this is very Orientalist thinking. Orientalism is the understanding of the East from the Western perspective, and Asians have not been able to overcome Orientalism. Even in Korea as I mentioned earlier, there is much higher regard for white people coming from developed countries, in comparison to Asians from developing parts of Asia, or Africans. They are not shown much respect. Even with Japan challenging the United States as a competing power in the 1980s and now China, Asians are generally not respected on the international stage as much as Americans, for example. Ironically, that is quite true, or even worse in Asia. 

The Black Lives Matter protest movement that began in the United States has greatly expanded in its global reach, although less so in East Asia. Why has the BLM movement against racism found so little resonance or support in East Asian countries?

If you compare the Black Lives Matter movement to the #MeToo movement, the #MeToo movement had much greater impact in South Korea. BLM has not had very much impact so far in South Korea, Japan, or China for different reasons. Korea had a very strong feminist movement already. #MeToo was immediately embraced by feminists and developed very quickly, but BLM has hardly found any resonance or community in East Asia. 

For Japan and South Korea, ethnic homogeneity is still very strong. There are ethnic minorities, but the population is very small. There have been some movements from ethnic minorities in Japan, but they have very little voice and are not as well-organized as BLM here. In the case of Korea, once again, most ethnic minorities are foreigners and often temporary residents, whereas black people have a much longer history in the U.S. In Korea, the majority came as adults, rather than being born and growing up there. There are some NGOs advocating for the rights of those migrants, but their impact is still limited. China is a different case. The Chinese government officially recognizes 56 different ethnic groups, with Han Chinese being the majority. China is very nervous about the breakup of the national minority structure, which is why they are repressing Xinjiang and Tibet. China suppresses any movements advocating for independence of national minorities. Japan, Korea, and China have not been much receptive to the BLM movement, for these different reasons. 

We can learn a lot from the BLM movement in studying racism in Asia but there exists a separation between Asian Studies and ethnic studies. While race and ethnicity are popular topics of discussion in the U.S., they are not much talked about in Japan or South Korea, which may also explain why there is so little resonance in East Asian countries. We, Asian experts, need to learn from the insights of ethnic studies in addressing racism in Asia.

South Korea notably has no legal protections against racial discrimination. Is this likely to change in the future, given the changing values of the younger generation?

Overall, Korea is improving protection against discrimination, especially with regards to gender and sexual minorities. They are moving in the right direction. In contrast, racial discrimination does not get much attention from the public, the media, or the government because the ethnic minority population is so small. The same goes to religious minority. For example, there are more than 100,000 Muslims in Korea right now, but there are very few Koreans who even know that there are so many Muslims. Most of them do not really understand Muslim culture, and may mainly associate them with terrorists. It is a lack of understanding and ignorance, and even though they exist, Koreans just ignore them. The Black community in Korea is even smaller, so they do not see it affecting Korean society that much. They understand that it is a global issue, but do not see it as their issue yet. 

How has the outbreak of COVID-19 exacerbated racial inequalities in South Korea?

COVID-19 certainly made the situation much more difficult for the foreign unskilled workers in Korea. The majority of them are physical workers in non-office jobs, which means they cannot work remotely. Many of them have been forced out of jobs, so they either have to go back to their country of origin or stay in Korea without stimulus funds or medical and other financial assistance that are available to Korean citizens. Many of them are also illegal or unregistered workers, so they have to hide from the government even if they do have symptoms or come into contact with the virus. Recently, there has been a number of unassisted COVID-19 deaths of unregistered foreign workers in Korea because they avoided seeking medical treatment out of a fear that they might be deported. The pandemic has also increased inequalities for society as a whole, so those already suffering from racial inequality experience it even more. Even here in the U.S., it is one story if a white male spreads COVID-19, but it is another if a Chinese one spreads it. There are similar aspects of racial discrimination in Korea. It makes bigger news if a foreign worker spreads the virus, and feeds into the same kind of prejudice.

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Protections against gender and sexual discrimination are increasing in South Korea, but addressing longstanding racial discriminations based in nationalism and building a multicultural identity still has a long way to go, says Gi-Wook Shin in a new interview with Asia Experts Forum.

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Across the world, societies are experiencing unprecedented demographic shifts as migration and aging reshape population landscapes. At the forefront of this global transformation is the Asia-Pacific region, particularly the countries of East Asia. Demographics and Innovation in the Asia-Pacific — a new book edited by APARC Director Gi-Wook Shin, Deputy Director Karen Eggleston, and Joon-Shik Park, a professor in the Department of Sociology at Hallym University in Chuncheon, Korea — provides a multidisciplinary examination of the demographic challenges facing East Asian nations and possible solutions.

At a virtual book launch held on March 2, 2021, contributing chapter authors James FeyrerJoon-Shik Park, and Kenji Kushida joined Karen Eggleston to discuss their findings.

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Published in APARC’s in-house series, the book is the second volume resulting from APARC’s Stanford Asia-Pacific Research Innovation project. It collects the research findings of participants at the project’s third conference that was held in South Korea in June 2019.

James Liang, a research professor of economics at Peking University and a leading scholar of demographics and social studies, opened the event by situating the discussion about population structure in the context of the U.S.-China technology race. China is quickly catching up with the United States in the quality of its talent pool and the number of its labor resources. It will continue to outpace and surpass the United States in talent and innovation power in the next 10-20 years, Liang says.

China, however, is on a demographic cliff, facing severe population aging and low fertility rates. Its population of young workers aged 25-44 year-olds is projected to decline much faster and sooner than its overall population, leveling out against the labor and innovation gains the United States makes through the inflow of international talent into U.S. universities and entrepreneurial ventures. To sustain its long-term growth in labor quality and innovation, China will need higher birth rates and additional talent gains through migration, argues Liang.

James Feyrer’s book chapter examines the macroeconomic relationship between workforce demographics and aggregate productivity in Asia. Feyrer confirms that the high-income Asian nations like Japan and Korea, and even some middle-income countries of the region, will no longer enjoy a “demographic dividend” boosting aggregate productivity. However, he finds that the negative consequences of shifting to an older population structure may be less severe than previously projected, and even weakening with time. Feyrer believes this may be a result of improved food security and better overall health experienced by old cohorts in childhood, reinforcing the long-reaching impacts of healthcare on societal well-being.

Joon-Shik Park focused on the specific challenges facing Korean society, where birth rates have dropped severely. These historic declines continue to contribute to rising social and political unevenness across Korean society today. Initially seen most visibly in rural areas and smaller villages, Park’s now sees this unevenness affecting the dynamics of medium-sized towns and more urban areas as well. Korea and other aging societies must find viable solutions to address these issues if they are to prevent demographic divides from hobbling development and innovation, Park says.

Closing the book launch event, APARC Research scholar Kenji Kushida offers perspectives from rapidly aging Japan. where the challenges of shrinking and aging populations, rural-to-urban population distribution, and labor shortages spur advances in technology and innovation. Kushida documents this trend across multiple sectors.

He shows that drone technology has increased the productivity of short-staffed surveying firms, while AI-assisted industrial machines allow a broader range of laborers to work in manufacturing. Even in traditionally human-dominated environments like nursing homes, staff increasingly use robots to help improve the physical and mental well-being of elderly patients. Rather than strictly retarding growth, Kushida makes the case that demographic challenges serve as a catalyst for the development and implementation of new technologies.

As the research collected in Demographics and Innovation in the Asia-Pacific demonstrates, the challenges facing aging Asian societies are complex, but there is reason to look to the future with optimism. As the editors of the volume state in their introduction to the book, “Few concepts are as critical for sustained improvement in living standards as innovation.” New technologies and solutions will be foundational to addressing the challenges of the new demographic frontiers many societies are now approaching.

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Contributing authors to the new volume 'Demographics and Innovation in the Asia-Pacific' convened for a virtual book launch and discussion of the challenges facing aging societies in East Asia and the roles technology and innovation may play in rebalancing them.

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Demographic transition, along with the economic and geopolitical re-emergence of Asia, are two of the largest forces shaping the twenty-first century, but little is known about the implications for innovation. The countries of East Asia have some of the oldest age structures on the planet: between now and 2050, the population that is age 65 and older will increase to more than one in four Chinese, and to more than one in three Japanese and Koreans. Other economies with younger populations, like India, face the challenge of fully harnessing the “demographic dividend” from large cohorts in the working ages.

This book delves into how such demographic changes shape the supply of innovation and the demand for specific kinds of innovation in the Asia-Pacific. Social scientists from Asia and the United States offer multidisciplinary perspectives from economics, demography, political science, sociology, and public policy; topics range from the macroeconomic effects of population age structure, to the microeconomics of technology and the labor force, to the broader implications for human well-being. Contributors analyze how demography shapes productivity and the labor supply of older workers, as well as explore the aging population as consumers of technologies and drivers of innovations to meet their own needs, as well as the political economy of spatial development, agglomeration economies, urban-rural contrasts, and differential geographies of aging.

Desk, examination, or review copies can be requested through Stanford University Press.

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Karen Eggleston
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Gi-Wook Shin
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We often think of language as a democratic field, but it is not quite the common property of its speakers, argues Jeffrey Weng, APARC’s 2020-21 postdoctoral fellow on contemporary Asia. Rather, language is a skill that must be learned, says Weng, and it creates social divisions as much as it bridges divides. 

Weng studies the social, cultural, and political nature of language, with a focus on the evolution of language, ethnicity, and nationalism in China. His doctoral dissertation investigates the historical codification of Mandarin as the dominant language of contemporary mainland China. This summer, he will begin his appointment as an assistant professor at National Taiwan University. In this interview, Weng discusses the dynamics between linguistic and social change and the implications of his research for Asian societies today.


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What has shaped your interest and research into the study of language and linguistic dissemination?

As a first-grade student in the early 1990s attending Chinese school in central New Jersey on Saturday mornings, I learned how to write my first complete sentence in the language: “I am an overseas Chinese.” Now, this was a curious sentence to teach to a class full of American-born children of Taiwanese parents, and it’s a reminder that language is never a neutral conveyor of meaning. Language cannot but be freighted with social, cultural, and political import, a lesson reinforced in my high-school Spanish classes, in which I made my first forays into literature in a foreign language: stories by the great writers of Spain and Latin America not only spoke a wholly different language, but they told wholly different stories from those of their British and American counterparts.

Linguistic difference also is a signal of individual and social difference: my childhood visits with family in Taiwan opened my ears to a cacophonous Babel in the media and on the streets—though we spoke Mandarin at home, whenever we went out, people speaking Taiwanese were everywhere to be seen and heard. This was further amplified when I visited mainland China for the first time in my early 20s. Beijing, the supposed wellspring of the nation’s language, was bewildering—I could not understand much of the unselfconscious speech of the locals. And traveling several hundred miles in any direction would only deepen my incomprehension. And yet, on the radio and on TV, during formal events and on university campuses, there was always Mandarin to clear the way. I wanted to learn more about how this language situation came to be. For me, studying the social, cultural, and political nature of language is a way to a deeper understanding of how people are united and divided in vastly different contexts across the globe.

As you’ve looked deeper into how language shapes society and society shapes language, what is something surprising you’ve come to realize about that relationship?

People often see language as the ultimate democratic field when it comes to cultural practice. No matter how much you might tell people not to split their infinitives or end their sentences with prepositions, popular practice will always win the day. Or so we English speakers think. Ever since Merriam-Webster came out with its infamously descriptivist Third New International Dictionary in 1961, Anglophone language nerds have fought over whether dictionaries should be “prescriptive”—that is, rule-setting—or “descriptive”—reflective of popular usage. But really, these are two sides of the same coin. We take it for granted that privately-owned publishers of dictionaries spell out the supposed norms of our language. Not only that, we even think this ought to be the case. French is the usual counterexample: when government language authorities in Quebec or Paris try to stem the Anglophone tide, we think it absurd that so-called authorities would ever try to rule over something so fundamentally unruly as language.

In my research, however, I learned how fundamentally invented Mandarin as a language is—from its highly artificial pronunciation to the way its orthography has been stabilized. There used to be a lot of variability in how characters were written and how they could be used, much like English spelling before the 18th century. Mandarin, both spoken and written, was standardized only in the 1920s to facilitate mass literacy and national cohesion. So linguistic change might often follow and reflect social change, but the process can also operate in reverse—a government can change language in hopes of facilitating social change.

In your latest journal publication, you argue that language nationalization in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam between 1870-1950 was a state-led, top-down process directed at remaking society rather than the more traditional view of diffusion through trade, economics, and cultural exchange. Why is this an important distinction to make?

Again, we often see language as a democratic field, the common property of its speakers, but it isn’t really. Sociolinguists are often quick to remind us that linguistic differences reflect class differences—“proper” language is that of “educated” speakers. But language is a skill, and skills must be learned. Some people can learn skills more easily than others, whether through natural ability or, more importantly, the life circumstances they were born into. Rich people can more easily get a good education. Educational disparities are now part and parcel of today’s broader debates about inequality. But the very fact that we think this is a problem is a product of developments in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Before then, broad swaths of humanity were totally illiterate and had no chance at being educated, and most people did not think this was a problem. In Europe, the language of the Church and academia, even to some extent in Protestant areas, was Latin until the 18th century. Local vernaculars had gradually developed as independent media of communication in government chancelleries and popular literature since the Middle Ages, but they did not really gain ascendancy until the age of print-capitalism and nationalism in the 18th and 19th centuries. Marxian-influenced scholars have therefore concluded that the rise of national languages coincided with the rise of the bourgeoisie, whose own languages became those of the nations they constructed.

In France, for example, while revolutionaries in the 1790s advocated the use of Parisian French to unify a country divided by hundreds of local forms of speech, into the mid-19th century, even journeying 50 miles outside Paris found travelers having trouble making themselves understood to the locals. It took more than a century for French to gain a foothold in most of the country. Asia, too, was a polyglot patchwork for millennia, unified at the top by an arcane language much like Latin—Classical Chinese. This situation became politically untenable in the 19th century as European imperialism encroached on traditional sovereignties in China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. In order to counter the foreign threat, governments sought to strengthen their societies by educating their populations, which required making it easier to learn how to read and write. While standard languages have been described by historians and sociolinguists as “artificial” for less-privileged learners, Asia’s standard languages were artificial even to their bourgeois inventors.

Our understanding of the present is invariably colored by our interpretation of the past: if we understand a national language to be a bourgeois imposition that diffused via economic development, then we more easily see its continued imposition as a perpetuation of class prejudices. If on the other hand, we see an invented national language as a tool for bridging regional divisions and expanding economic opportunity for our children, then we feel much more positively about the spread of such languages. Both interpretations can be true at the same time, but we must remember that one is inseparable from the other.

Do you see any parallels between how language nationalization has occurred in the past to how language and society are shaping one another in the present?

The number of “standard” Mandarin speakers in the early 1930s could be counted on one hand. Today, it’s the world’s largest language by a number of “native” speakers. Though it began as an elite nationalizing project that was largely ignored by the masses of people in China, Mandarin is now more often seen as a hegemonic threat to local languages and cultures. Language can thus bridge divides, but also create new divisions. People in China are often ambivalent about the pace of change these days. When I visited cousins in rural Fujian during the Lunar New Year a few years ago, I noticed that all my nieces and nephews spoke Mandarin in almost all situations, to their parents, and especially to one another. Only my grandparents’ generation used the local Fuqing dialect as a matter of course. My parents’ generation spoke dialect to their parents, but a mix of Mandarin and dialect to their children—the cousins of my generation, who were able to speak the dialect, but were more comfortable speaking Mandarin among themselves and to their children. One of my young nieces who’d grown up in Beijing, where her parents had moved for work, even had a perfect Beijing accent. In a span of three generations, migration due to expanded opportunity had wrought enormous change in language habits. Much had been gained, but also much had been lost.

How has your time at APARC as one of our Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellows aided your research project?

It’s certainly been a strange year to be a postdoc, given how we’ve all been operating remotely. Nevertheless, life and work have continued, and we’ve all been able to find new ways of building community and getting things done. I’ve personally benefited from the access to the vast academic resources of Stanford—library access, even online alone, is a lifeline to any researcher. Moreover, I’ve had the opportunity to chat on Zoom with Stanford faculty about research and connect with my fellow postdocs to support one another as we figure out how to move forward in our careers in these challenging times.

With your recent appointment as an assistant professor at National Taiwan University in Taipei, how do you anticipate your research interests growing and developing given the tension between Taiwan and China?

I am gratified to begin my academic career in a place of such diversity and openness as Taiwan. Language and identity are constant sites of contention in Taiwan's politics, and I look forward to expanding my on-the-ground understanding of these issues as I begin teaching in the sociology department at National Taiwan University. It is nothing short of miraculous that democracy has flourished at such an intersection of empires, colonialism, repressions, and struggles. And it is unsettling to see that flourishing takes place in such a precarious geopolitical location. NTU's sociology department is at the forefront of understanding all of these vital issues as we barrel forward into an ever more uncertain future.

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Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow in Contemporary Asia Jeffrey Weng shares insights from his research into how language and society shape one another, particularly how the historical use of Mandarin affects contemporary Chinese society and linguistics.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted economies and expectations for economic growth and development the world over. But even before the pandemic, Asian economies were reassessing their growth strategies.

In a podcast conversation about the new edited volume Shifting Gears in Innovation Policy: Strategies from Asia, APARC's Korea Program Deputy Director Yong Suk Lee discusses some of the impediments Asian countries face in trying to encourage economic development and entrepreneurship, but also the inherent strengths that could allow innovative strategies take hold and grow in East Asia. Listen to the full conversation below.

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Edited by Lee, Gi-Wook Shin, and Takeo HoshiShifting Gears in Innovation Policy is the first of three volumes resulting from APARC's Stanford Asia-Pacific Innovation project that produces policy research to promote innovation and entrepreneurship in East Asia and the greater Asia-Pacific region.

Lee explains, “Many Asian countries achieved economic growth by importing new technologies from advanced economies like the U.S., using them very effectively, and then expanding exports. But now where East Asia stands, many of these countries have already successfully caught up to the technological frontier of advanced economies, so if they want to maintain growth, there needs to be a shift in their strategies.”

The shift Lee and the other volume authors propose is one towards economic growth that is driven by innovation and entrepreneurship rather than the ‘catch-up’ model that Asian economies have commonly relied on. Unlike startup hubs such as the San Francisco Bay Area of California, Asian countries often lack an entrepreneurial tradition because of antagonistic financial structures and differences in cultural definitions of success. These additional financial and social risks have cast entrepreneurial endeavors in an unattractive light for multiple generations of workers.

But encouraging entrepreneurship and endemic innovation are crucial to maintaining stable economic growth. With rapidly aging populations, greater interconnections in both trade and diplomacy, and transformation in the workforce, workplace, and work itself, effectively adapting development strategies to meet present and future challenges remains a central priority for East Asia policymakers and innovators alike. As Lee advises, “There’s strong infrastructure in East Asia, both physically and digitally, which is a great advantage. But they’re now at a frontier with no trajectory to follow, and there needs to be indigenous growth and continuous innovation in order to not be surpassed by competitors.”

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Yong Suk Lee explains in the new volume, Shifting Gears in Innovation Policy, that while ‘catch-up’ strategies have been effective in promoting traditional economic growth in Asia, innovative policy tools that foster entrepreneurship will be needed to maintain competitiveness in the future.

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To watch the recording of the event, click here.

While many countries around the world have slipped toward authoritarianism, South Korea has won praise for exhibiting democratic resilience through “candlelight protests” and a presidential impeachment. But Korea's democracy has likewise begun to show signs of decay, as democratic norms and spirits have been violated under the guise of rule of law. Troublingly, this trend has been growing under the government led by former pro-democracy activists. In this panel, scholars of Korean democracy, including a former activist, will discuss whether concerns about Korea's democratic decline are warranted and whether Korean liberals are truly liberal.

Panelists:

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Byoungjin Ahn
Byongjin Ahn is a professor of American Studies at Kyung Hee University, where he was the rector of the Global Academy for Future Civilization. His main research area includes American presidency and its implications on Korean politics. He is currently writing a book on the rise and decline of Korean liberalism. He holds a Ph.D. from the New School for Social Research where he received Hannah Arendt Award for his doctoral dissertation, “Learning to Speak American: The Use of Values Appeals in the 1984 and 1996 Presidential Elections.” He has published several books in Korean, including The Roots of Crisis in Democracy and Conservatism after Democratization (pulbit press, 2008).

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Aram Hur
Aram Hur is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Missouri, where she also serves as Co-Director for the MU Institute for Korean Studies. Her research focuses on national politics and democracy, with particular focus on issues of national identity change, integration, and democratic support in East Asia. Her work is published in academic journals such as the British Journal of Political ScienceComparative Politics, and Journal of East Asian Studies, and has been cited in media outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, and Foreign Policy. She holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University, M.P.P. from the Harvard Kennedy School, and B.A. from Stanford University. 

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Gi-Wook Shin
The discussion will be led by Gi-Wook Shin, William J. Perry Professor of Contemporary Korea and director of Shorestein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University.

Via Zoom: Register at https://bit.ly/3aceTJM

Byong Jin Ahn <I>Kyung Hee University</i>
Aram Hur <I> University of Missouri</I>
Gi-Wook Shin <I>Stanford University</I>
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In the last four years of the Trump presidency, there has been no shortage of inflammatory rhetoric directed towards both partners and competitors in the Asia-Pacific. With the Biden administration now about to take office, APARC convened a center-wide panel to discuss how different regions of the Asia-Pacific are responding to the incoming presidency and recent events in the United States, and what issues the new administration should consider as it moves into a new era of U.S.-Asia policies. The panelists included APARC Director Gi-Wook Shin, FSI Center Fellow Oriana Skylar Mastro, Japan Program Director Kiyoteru Tsutsui, Southeast Asia Program Director Donald K. Emmerson, and Shorenstein Fellow Thomas Fingar. Watch the full discussion below:

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Soft Power and U.S.-China Competition

One thing the Trump administration has identified correctly and managed to get consensus on, says Chinese military and security expert Oriana Skylar Mastro, is that the United States is in a great-power competition with China. Biden now accepts this framework, and Mastro expects him to maintain the basic principles of U.S. Asia policy, such as strategic ambiguity and ensuring Taiwan’s defense through arms sales. The difference will be in Biden’s approach, which is based on “multilateralism, strengthening partnerships, and not trying to provoke Beijing for the sake of provoking Beijing.” This approach, believes Mastro, is going to improve the U.S. position in terms of competition.

Beijing has never built its attractiveness on its political system. But the Trump administration has made political values the core of its soft power strategy. So when you have hits against political values, those hurt the United States much more than it hurts China.
Oriana Skylar Mastro
FSI Center Fellow

A core component of the U.S.-China great-power competition, however, is soft power — the ability of countries to get what they want through persuasion or attraction in the form of culture, values, and policies. Soft power, argues Mastro, is an area that is very hard for a president to have control over and rebuild, and American soft power has taken a tremendous hit with the breach of the U.S. Capitol on January 6. Demonstrating the decline of American democracy, the scenes from the pro-Trump mob attack have been a win for China and are hardly encouraging for U.S. partners and allies.

Biden can do a lot to tackle U.S. domestic problems and improve the political image of America abroad. But soft power, concludes Mastro, is organic. “I fear that President-elect Biden is going to learn that soft power, once lost, is very difficult to regain.”

The U.S.-Japan Alliance and Security in the Asia-Pacific

In shifting to relations between the United States and Japan, Kiyoteru Tsutsui focuses on how the traditional aspects of the Japan-U.S. alliance are playing out in the current geopolitical theater. In Tsutsui’s view, Japan’s early brushes with Chinese might in the 2010s has left the country particularly keen on ensuring that a strong counterbalance exists to China’s strategic advantage.

To that end, Japan has proactively partnered with other nations on trade deals such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). The fact that both of these major free trade agreements were concluded without U.S. involvement is significant, and whether President Biden makes any response will be “one the more closely watched issues among foreign policy experts in the coming years,” by Tsutsui’s measure.

The reemergence of ‘the Quad,’ and even discussions of a ‘Quad+’ that includes nations such as South Korea, is of particular interest to Tsutsui. Such groups provide additional avenues for further developing the ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’ strategy originally envisioned by Prime Minister Abe. But Tsutsui is also not opposed to the idea of engaging China directly in multilateral efforts as long as China understands the U.S. and Japan’s resolve in countering Chinese aggression and non-peaceful ambitions.

The Korean Peninsula in the Spotlight

When it comes to engagement on the Korean peninsula, Gi-Wook Shin hopes the new administration will avoid a reactionary response and backsliding into old habits. The temptation to respond with an “anything but Trump’s” approach to handling relations with North Korea may be strong, particularly given the president’s unusually forward relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, but Shin counsels to not set aside everything Trump did in regards to the DPRK.

It is important for Biden to send Kim Jong Un a clear message that if North Korea is willing to negotiate again with the United States, then they should not try to make any provocation but wait until his team is ready to reengage.
Gi-Wook Shin
Director of APARC and the Korea Program

“Bringing North Korea and Kim Jong Un more into the international community was an important step that no other president has made,” he says. Shin strongly cautions against a return to the strategic patience typical of the Obama era. With Kim’s consolidated control and North Korea’s wielding far more advanced nuclear capabilities and significantly strengthened ties to China than it did eight years ago, a return to previous patterns of diplomacy would fail to address the present circumstances on the Korean peninsula. Shin urges the Biden administration to reemphasize human rights and deepening dialogues with its diplomatic counterparts in Seoul. He foresees an improvement in U.S.-ROK relations but warns that North Korea can be a source of tension between the two allies.

Opportunities for Allies in Southeast Asia

Donald Emmerson also recommends strengthening diplomatic ties to the nations of Southeast Asia and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). By his assessment, “ASEAN needs creativity. It needs new ideas rather than simply following the path of least resistance.” Emmerson envisions this well-spring of creativity coming in part from robust new efforts by the United States to engage with the region diplomatically and academically.

Existing forums such as the Bali Democracy Forum can provide a ready-made platform for engagement, while active participation in gatherings such as the Global Town Hall organized earlier this year by the Foreign Policy Community of Indonesia (FPCI) provide easy opportunities for the United States to meaningfully engage with Southeast Asia.

An Outlook on the Broader Asia-Pacific

Closing out the panel’s remarks, Thomas Fingar offers measured optimism for the future. “I think the incoming U.S. approach to the countries in Asia, China included, is going to be pragmatic and instrumental, not transactional. Every nation who thinks they can contribute, does contribute, and is willing to play by a rules-based order can be part of the solution.”

Fingar expects the Biden administration’s foreign policy to be “focused on problems, not places” — to be driven less by particular animosity or affection for certain countries and more by addressing global issues that promote American interests, such as climate change, the impediments in the international system to advancing American economy, and preserving security.

By consensus, the incoming Biden administration’s most immediate concerns are overwhelmingly domestic. But as Mastro articulated, the effects of the United States’ domestic policies directly impact its perception, standing, and sphere of influence around the globe.

Effective relationships between the United States and the Asia-Pacific cannot be sustained in the long term with an ongoing ‘America first’ agenda or by pursuing zero-sum goals. Rather, the Biden administration must focus on finding solutions to multilateral needs by working side-by-side with Asian nations as co-sponsors and co-leaders.

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Ahead of President-elect Biden’s inauguration and on the heels of the attack on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob that has left America shaken, an APARC-wide expert panel provides a region-by-region analysis of what’s next for U.S. policy towards Asia and recommendations for the new administration.

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This event is made possible by generous support from the Korea Foundation and other friends of the Korea Program.

This event is part of Shorenstein APARC's winter webinar series "Asian Politics and Policy in a Time of Uncertainty."

Judiciary independence is explicitly prescribed in the constitutions of many democracies. The courts are expected to be independent from the legislative or executive branch of the government. In practice, however, presidents can influence the judiciary by appointing judges who share political viewpoints with themselves to the highest courts. This was the case in both the Trump administration in the U.S. and the Moon administration in South Korea. Subsequently, there were several high-profile cases where the Supreme Court of South Korea made decisions on controversial and political cases in recent years, sometimes going against judicial norms and practices. In this panel, three legal scholars discuss these cases and the implications of the politicization of the judiciary for democracy in South Korea, and comparatively with the U.S.

Panelists:

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Tom Ginsburg


Tom Ginsburg is the Leo Spitz Professor of International Law at the University of Chicago, where he also holds an appointment in the Political Science Department. He holds B.A., J.D. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of California at Berkeley. He currently co-directs the Comparative Constitutions Project, an NSF-funded data set cataloging the world’s constitutions since 1789, that runs the award-winning Constitute website.  His latest book is How to Save a Constitutional Democracy (2018, with Aziz Huq), which won the Best Book Award from the International Society for Constitutional Law, and his other books include Judicial Reputation: A Comparative Theory (2015) (with Nuno Garoupa); The Endurance of National Constitutions (2009) (with Zachary Elkins and James Melton)which won the best book award from Comparative Democratization Section of American Political Science Association; and Judicial Review in New Democracies (2003), winner of the C. Herman Pritchett Award from APSA. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.  Before entering law teaching, he served as a legal advisor at the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal, The Hague, Netherlands, and he has consulted with numerous international development agencies and governments on legal and constitutional reform. He currently serves a senior advisor on Constitution Building to International IDEA.

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Seongwook Heo

Seongwook Heo is a professor of public law at Seoul National University Law School. He teaches administrative law, environmental law, and law and economics. He received his Ph.D. in law and L.L.M., and bachelor's degree in economics, all from Seoul National University. His research interests include topics of economic regulations with analytic tools of economics. Recently he is mostly interested in laws concerning climate change, energy, food safety, IT & privacy, and judicial system. Prior to joining the SNU Law School in 2006, he had served as a judge of Seoul Central District Court in Korea. He was a presiding judge of a specialized panel for the intellectual property law cases in the Seoul Central District Court from 2005 to 2006. He is currently a board member of the Korean Public Law Association, the Korean Environmental Law Association, the Korean Law and Economics Association, and the Korean Regulation Law Association

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Julie Suk

Julie C. Suk is a Florence Rogatz Visiting Professor of Law (fall term) and research scholar at Yale Law School and professor of sociology & political science at The Graduate Center of City University of New York. She has a J.D. from Yale Law School, where she studied on a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans and a D.Phil. in Politics from Oxford University, where she held a Marshall Scholarship. Suk is an interdisciplinary legal scholar, focusing on women as constitution-makers at the intersection of law, history, sociology, and politics. Her broader research interests include constitutional and social change; antidiscrimination law and its effects on social inequality; women, work, and family; civil litigation as an enforcement mechanism for public law; access to justice, including the past and future role of nonlawyers in solving the civil justice problems of poor and middle-income people; social, political, and legal theory; and law and literature. Her 2020 book, We the Women: The Unstoppable Mothers of the Equal Rights Amendmentexplores the ERA’s past to guide its future, telling the stories of the forgotten women lawmakers and lawyers who shaped the ERA over a century. She is a frequent commentator in the media on legal issues affecting women, including The New York TimesThe Washington Post, Bloomberg Law, Vox, and CBS News.

The panel discussion will be moderated by Yong Suk Lee, the SK Center Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and deputy director of the Korea Program at Stanford's Shorenstein APARC.

 

Via Zoom: Register at https://bit.ly/3ouPuR7

Tom Ginsburg
Seongwook Heo
Julie C. Suk
Panel Discussions

In recent years, we have witnessed a worldwide trend of "democratic depression" in both young and established democracies, where the backsliding from democracy is facilitated by various forces such as populism, nationalism, partisan polarization, and post-truth. Korea is no exception. While the signs of democratic decline are subtle and disguised under the rule of law, they are producing piecemeal erosions of liberal democracy and pluralism in many corners of the Korean society. As a timely warning against the gradual decline of democratic norms and values, this 3-part conference seeks to examine the forces that endanger the Korean democracy and aims to offer some concrete policy prescriptions to remedy the existing and growing signs of democratic decline.

Topics Discussed:

Day 1: November 12, 2020 (4PM-7PM)

  • Political culture and polarization: Pitfall of political over-participation or “street-democracy"
  • Underdevelopment of party politics: Factionalism, weak institutionalization, and poor appreciation
  • Erosion in balance of power: Courts losing legitimacy and respect with politicization
  • Uses and misuses of nationalism in politics

Day 2: November 13, 2020 (4PM-6PM)

  • Two divergences in South Korea’s Economy: Regional and generational disparities
  • Challenges of post-truth: Politicization and polarization of the press, social media, disinformation
  • Education and its impact on civic value and generational gap

Day 3: November 19, 2020 (4PM-6:15PM)

  • Politicization of civil society: Losing function as watchdog of power, former democratic activists becoming new authoritarian leaders
  • How the rise of populist regime affects foreign policy
  • Korean democracy in comparative perspectives

The conference papers will be published as an edited volume.

Via Zoom

Conferences

Room N341, Neukom Building
Stanford Law School

(650) 724-8754
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Senior Fellow, by courtesy, at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
William F. Baxter-Visa International Professor of Law
Faculty Affiliate at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Faculty Affiliate at the Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions
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Curtis J. Milhaupt’s research and teaching interests include comparative corporate governance, the legal systems of East Asia (particularly Japan), and state capitalism. In addition to numerous scholarly articles, he has co-authored or edited seven books, including Regulating the Visible Hand? The Institutional Implications of Chinese State Capitalism (Oxford, 2016), Law and Capitalism: What Corporate Crises Reveal about Legal Systems and Economic Development Around the World (Chicago, 2008) and Transforming Corporate Governance in East Asia (Routledge, 2008). His research has been profiled in The Economist, the Financial Times, and the Wall Street Journal and has been widely translated. He is a Research Associate of the European Corporate Governance Institute and a member of the American Law Institute.

Prior to his Stanford appointment in 2018, Prof. Milhaupt held chaired professorships in comparative corporate law and Japanese law at Columbia Law School, where he served on the faculty for nearly two decades. He has held numerous visiting appointments at US and foreign universities and is the recipient of two teaching awards. He has been affiliated with think tanks such as the Bank of Japan’s Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies and has been a member of several international project teams focused on major policy issues in Asia, including one charged with designing an “institutional blueprint” for a unified Korean peninsula.

Prior to entering academia, Professor Milhaupt practiced corporate law in New York and Tokyo with a major law firm. He holds a J.D. from Columbia Law School and a B.A. from the University of Notre Dame.  He also conducted graduate studies in law and international relations at the University of Tokyo.

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