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A review of the dilemmas, tensions and contradictions arising from democratic consolidation in South Korea. It explores the turbulent features of Korean democracy in its first decade, assesses the progress that has been made, and identifies the key obstacles to effective democratic governance.
Presenting a succinct, historically informed introduction to North and South Korea, the second edition of The Koreas considers the radically different ways these countries have dealt with the growing challenges of globalization. Since the first edition’s publication, the economic, political, and social differences have only intensified, making evident the relevancy and importance of Armstrong’s work, in understanding the Koreas now and in the future. Ultimately, The Koreas is a crisp, engaging primer of Korea and the Korean people in the contemporary world. This book is ideal for many courses in a variety of disciplines, including politics, history, international business, and Asian studies.
During his more than 50 years in politics, Democratic strategist Douglas E. Schoen has produced nearly two dozen books that have deftly dissected national and international crises and offered prescriptions for solving them. Now, in The Politics of Life: My Road to the Middle of a Hostile and Adversarial World, Schoen delivers his most personal work. Bringing to life the antiwar youthquake of his Harvard years, Schoen introduces us to Cornel West, Walter Isaacson, Merrick Garland, and other classmates bound for glory. A tense summer in Mississippi helps Schoen appreciate the long game of candidate Charles Evers, a bootlegger-pimp turned civil rights crusader. In New York, he witnesses the twi...
This book is a collection of 16 essays by international authors who participated in an academic conference on Korea sponsored by the U.S. Naval War College. Papers were originally presented at the Naval War College's Asia-Pacific Forum, the annual conference of the college's Asia-Pacific Studies Group, held in Newport, R.I., on 26-27 August 2004.
When and why do democratic governments respond to their citizens?
In 1987 South Korea began a democratic transition after almost three decades of significant economic development under authoritarian rule. Increased civil unrest caused by dissatisfaction resulted in the regime agreeing to constitutional changes in the summer of 1987. By 1992 the first president without a military background was elected and during his tenure a further deepening of democracy took place. These reforms were instrumental in making it possible that in 1997 for the first time in South Korean history an opposition candidate was elected president. This book examines the initial transition and later attempts at consolidating democracy in South Korea, and argues that although significant progress had been made and a power alternation achieved by late 1997, South Korea could not, by the end of that decade (1987-97), be considered a consolidated democracy.
Why do some parties coordinate their electoral strategies as part of a pre-electoral coalition, while others choose to compete independently at election time? Scholars have long ignored pre-electoral coalitions in favor of focusing on the government coalitions that form after parliamentary elections. Yet electoral coalitions are common, they affect electoral outcomes, and they have important implications for democratic policy-making itself. The Logic of Pre-Electoral Coalition Formation by Sona Nadenichek Golder includes a combination of methodological approaches (game theoretic, statistical, and historical) to explain why pre-electoral coalitions form in some instances but not in others. Th...
As Asian countries emerge as global economic powers, many undergo fundamental political transformations. In Korean Democracy in Transition: A Rational Blueprint for Developing Societies, HeeMin Kim evaluates the past thirty years of political change in South Korea, including the decision of the authoritarian government to open up the political process in 1987 and the presidential impeachment of 2004. Kim uses rational choice theory—which holds that individuals choose to act in ways that they think will give them the most benefit for the least cost—to explain events central to South Korea’s democratization process. Kim’s theoretical and quantitative analysis provides a context for Sou...
While mainly focusing on the Kim Dae Jung era, the essays in this book examine persistent problems and new opportunities in Korean politics, economy, and culture. In 1997, Kim Ae Jung was elected to head the government of the Seventh Republic, after 30 years in opposition.
Igniting the Internet is one of the first books to examine in depth the development and consequences of Internet-born politics in the twenty-first century. It takes up the new wave of South Korean youth activism that originated online in 2002, when the country’s dynamic cyberspace transformed a vehicular accident involving two U.S. servicemen into a national furor that compelled many Koreans to reexamine the fifty-year relationship between the two countries. Responding to the accident, which ended in the deaths of two high school students, technologically savvy youth went online to organize demonstrations that grew into nightly rallies across the nation. Internet-born, youth-driven mass...