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In the South Korean society, there are ongoing debates over North Korea¡¯s change. The conservatives and the progressives in South Korean society have conflicting views on this issue. The progressives hold that North Korea has changed significantly, whereas the conservatives argue that it has not changed fundamentally. To end futile and divisive debates over North Korea¡¯s change and to build a national consensus on the Republic of Korea¡¯s engagement policy of national reconciliation and cooperation with the DPRK, it is important to operationally define the concept of North Korea¡¯s change and establish objective criteria for its measurement. The authors of this paper have three specific objectives: (1) to analyze ROK’s engagement policy toward North Korea as a catalyst for North Korea’s change; (2) to set up objective criteria for evaluating North Korea¡¯s change; and (3) to make policy recommendations for constructive inter-Korean relations. The authors attempt to operationalize the concept of North Korea’s change to avoid confusion about North Korea’s change. A clear distinction needs to be made between changes in the North Korean-style socialist system and changes in North Korean leadership¡¯s thinking and policy. We do not expect North Korea will change its socialist system in the short run because North Korean leadership fears a sudden systemic change, which would threaten the very survival of its own system. In this paper we attempt to analyze North Korea’s changes in terms of thinking and policy. We argue that North Korea’s changes in thinking and policy would eventually bring about its systemic change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The resurgence of democracies in non-Western world has been the global phenomenon since the mid 1970s. By now democracy has been consolidated in some countries, but some other new democracies remain precarious and unconsolidated. Transitions to democracy began with the institutional rearrangement of what Dahl called ¡*contestation¡± and ¡*participation¡±. Free, fair, and regular elections were introduced to realize these procedural conditions of democracy. Elections, however, did not bring democracy by default. South Korean experiment of democracy has been successful in terms of the introduction and the establishment of the formal and procedural features of democracy. But further democratization is stagnant and limited by the biased pluralism in the civil society. Regionalism and weak working class have been the two major sources of limited pluralism, which in turn makes the majority rule undemocratic in South Korea. This paper will discuss the possibility of the development of pluralism by tracing the recent changes in the social cleavage structure, regionalism, class cleavage, post-material and generation, and ideology. To do this the paper employs some basic statistical analyses of crosstabulation and simple regression. The survey data was prepare by the Korean Association of Party Studies and JoongAng Ilbo in South Korea in January, 2002. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Japan and South Korea have historically been considered strong and rather autonomous states, particularly in the realms of foreign and defense policy. Recently, however, both governments have faced varying degrees of public criticism concerning the kidnappings of their citizens by North Korea (DPRK) and their policies toward the North. Theories of state autonomy in decision-making predict that the groups articulating such public demands should have minimal influence over policy-making. Yet, particularly since September 2002 when Kim Jong-Il admitted that the DPRK had abducted thirteen Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s, the organization of Japanese abductees' families has gained significant political influence. Though the analogous association in South Korea represents the bereaved of a much larger group of abductees, that group has not been able to gain equivalent access to and influence over policy-making processes in the South. Why have these groups had such different degrees of success in influencing their governments' policies concerning the abductees and toward the DPRK? This paper uses the lens of the abductions issue to shed light on the nature of state-society relations and interest mediation in these two countries. This project analyzes the variations in success among advocacy groups by focusing on a subcategory advocacy groups: victims' organizations. These are groups of individuals who explicitly blame the deliberate actions or the negligence of their own government or another state for the physical harm they have suffered. By focusing on how changes in domestic political structures have altered the opportunity structure that victims' family associations face, this paper analyzes what the unusual case of the abductee saga reveals about broader questions of institutional change, victims' advocacy, and civil society's role at the intersection of domestic and international politics in Japan and South Korea. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the viewpoint of the US, there is an interesting puzzle in the current North Korean nuclear crisis. That is, judging from public reactions, Americans seems to be much more threatened by North Korean nuclear weapons lying thousands of miles away than South Koreans just 20 or 30 miles from them. Indeed, whenever North Korea escalates its brinkmanship, the stark contrast between the alarm it produces in Washington and the cool response in Seoul highlights the ever-changing attitude of South Koreans who increasingly refuse to see North Korea as their enemy. The main goal of this paper is to bring historical dimension to recent changes in the discursive construction of the image of North Korea among South Koreans. The Korean War (1950-1953) left deep scars between the two Koreas along with enormous social costs and human tragedies. Not surprisingly, there was little room for co-existence, let alone reconciliation, between them. As a result, North Korea was often portrayed as "a dangerous wolf" lurking in the darkness. By the early 1990s, however, it was obvious that the North Korean communist experiment had failed. In the meantime, South Korea had achieved dual goals of democratization and economic development. Under such circumstances, South Korea was able to take a more generous attitude towards its northern "half." That is, North Korea was increasingly described not so much as a dangerous threat as a part of the same nation in desperate need of help from its "southern brother." The data for this paper come from official textbooks for the elementary education in South Korea. Elementary education (grades one to six) is mandatory in South Korea where the government author, authorizes and sponsors the contents of the textbooks so that the entire population studies the same textbook. Since the end of the Korean War, there have been seven textbook reforms in South Korea. By analyzing the major characteristics of these different versions of textbooks over time, we will be able to understand how South Koreans have been imagining their northern neighbor differently, from "a dangerous wolf" who is trying to attack at any moment to "our blood brother" who needs to be embraced for the coming unification. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Voting in parliaments is a central process in representative democracies, and most parliaments have had at least some recorded ('roll-call') votes since they were first elected. Nevertheless, research on parliamentary voting has lagged behind research on other democratic processes, such as mass electoral behaviour. Part of this can be explained by a widely-held, yet mistaken, view amongst political scientists that studying voting in most parliaments is rather pointless because party cohesion is so high. Another reason is that parliamentary voting data are costly to use, either because they have to be entered by hand or because it requires a super computer to analyse more than a handful of votes. As a result, research on parliamentary voting focussed first on the U.S. Congress, where party cohesion is comparatively low, data is readily available, and where political scientists had access to super computers. Since the mid 1990s, however, there has been an explosion of research on voting in parliaments other the U.S. Congress. This was in large part due to the emergence of a new and easily-useable geometric scaling technology developed by Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal, known as NOMINATE. This new technology also coincided with the increased availability of voting data from other parliaments as a result of the internet and the development of computer power, which has enabled desktop computers to apply scaling technologies to very large voting matrices.What we do in this paper is contribute to this new research agenda by undertaking a spatial analysis of voting in the Korean National Assembly (KNA). This research is innovative for several reasons. Roll-call votes (called 'electronic votes' in the KNA) were first introduced in the KNA in March 1999, and this paper is the first attempt to study behaviour in these votes in detail. In addition, as far as we know, this is the first spatial analysis of roll-call voting in an Asian parliament. This is also one of the few analyses of parliamentary voting in an emerging democracy, since most existing work has focused on parliamentary behaviour in more established democracies in North America, Europe, or South America. And, the institutional context of the KNA provides an interesting laboratory for investigating some generalisable theoretical and methodological issues related to voting in parliaments.This paper starts with several research questions. At an empirical level, we aim to 'discover' the main dimensions of conflict in the KNA, the relative locations of the parties and individual KNA members, and how these dimensions and locations change between the 16th and 17th KNA. At a theoretical level, we investigate the impact of three types of institutions on parliamentary voting: parties, the electoral system, and agenda-setting powers. Finally, at a methodological level, we assess which of two geometric scaling methods, NOMINATE and Optimal Classification, works best when a high proportion of votes are 'lop-sided', in what Simon Jackman would call an 'extreme' roll-call setting (Jackman, 2005).The rest of the paper is organised as follows. In section two we discuss some general theoretical issues related to how exogenous preferences of parliamentarians translate into a 'revealed' behaviour space. In section three we provide some background on elections and parties in South Korea. In section four we present the results from applying NOMINATE and Optimal Classification to the KNA. In section five we use a regression analysis to look at the exogenous ideological and institutional determinants of voting in the KNA. Finally, section six contains a short conclusion. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explains why democratization destabilizes some asymmetric alliances more than others. I argue that democratization has the potential to destabilize asymmetric alliances because it unleashes a powerful force of nationalism in the political arena. Nationalist elites who come to power in democratizing states view military dependence and resultant foreign influence as a humiliating encroachment of sovereignty. Therefore, they demand an autonomous, equal partnership often in disregard of power disparity within the alliance. The major ally in turn resents their seemingly ungrateful demands and unreasonable policies, and therefore shows a decreased interest in the alliance. As a result of these frictions, the alliance becomes less stable. Democratization, however, does not evenly affect asymmetric alliances because it occurs in different threat environments and takes divergent paths. These factors mitigate or amplify the destructive potential of nationalist sentiments that democratization unleashes. This paper tests these arguments by analyzing three asymmetric alliances in which a weaker member democratized since the late 1980s: U.S. alignments with South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although in the long term, democratization is expected to exert pacifying effects on international relations, scholars have argued that conflict is more likely during democratic transitions. They argue that politicians in democratizing states are more likely to make jingoistic appeals, and coalitions of political, business, and/or military leaders are likely to form and to ?logroll? for military buildups and other destabilizing policies. This proposition has great significance for East Asia, which faces two potential political transitions: the democratization of China, and Korean unification. This paper tests a theory of democratization and conflict in the cases of three previous East Asian political transitions: Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea. I test not only for the occurrence of conflict, but also for the presence of the predicted mechanisms through which conflict occurs (nationalistic appeals and logrolling). I find that although there is some evidence of nationalistic posturing that is consistent with the theory?s predictions, for the most part, evidence from these cases does not support the theory. Leaders did not make jingoistic appeals; they were more likely to preach stability. Furthermore, I find that the public, the military, and the business community do have substantial influence over policy makers, but do not find that these groups advocated military buildups or offensive military strategies. This study casts doubt on the relevance of the ?democratization and war? thesis for future East Asian political transitions; it finds support for theories in the liberal school of international relations, including the beneficial effects of democratization, policies of engagement, and economic integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the rise and fall of the governing party during the authoritarin rule of Park Chung Hee in South Korea. I will explore the questions including: How and why did the party survive for such a long time? What role did the party play for the regime and for Park? Why did the party eventually fall to periphery within the regime despite its longevity? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyzes political party systems(or the effective number of parties)in terms of votes at the basic unit of competition in the first democratic elections before and after authoritarian interlude in South Korea and Indonesia. Specifically, it deals with the 1960 and 1988 Korean parliamentary elections, and the 1955 and 1999 Indonesian parliamentary elections. This historical comparative and cross-sectional analysis intends to test the key hypotheses in the comparative literature on political party systems:Duverger’s law and hypothesis, Taagepera and Shugart’s generalized Duverger’s rule, Cox’s M+1 rule and interaction hypothesis. I find, first, that bipartism is the exception rather than the rule even under simple and pure plurality rule, which implies that the thesis of strategic voting is misleading. Second, the interaction of high social diversity and weak electoral structure does not necessarily increase the effective number of parties(or candidates). Third, the immediate and most crucial determinant of political party systems is the winner’s(leading political party’s) vote share, regardless of electoral systems or district magnitude. More precisely, the effective number of parties is an inverse function of the winner’s vote share. Check author’s web site for an updated version of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper applies a process-centered perspective to empirically evaluating the Korean historical experiment in the late 1980?’s with a division of government power into opposing parties. Examination of various empirical indicators on legislative process detects a positive result under the divided government. During this period, Korean legislature acquired a relatively active role in initiating legislative agenda and no longer acquiescently accepted policy ideas from executive branch. National Assembly also amplified its voice on budget issues and stepped up efforts to oversee executive agencies. The parliamentary ascendancy helped restore a power balance between government branches. Unfortunately, this experience was short-lived by the infamous Three Parties Merger. Korean political history since testifies a persistent imbalance of power between executive and legislative branches. Here lies a historical lesson that a divided rule of government by rival parties might be a good recipe in Korea for alleviating a hegemonic executive and institutionalizing a balanced democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the new left in Taiwan and South Korea and the renewed left in Brazil and Chile. I contend that the left can no longer best understood in terms of antiquated sociological or economic categories. The new left in East Asia and Latin America is a political project and its politics are embedded in the processes of democratic transition. My argument is simple: (i) Democratization, a variable process of change, leads to different patterns of new left organization. (ii) Meanwhile, the introduction of democracy, a form of governance with universally shared features (irrespective of how the transition to democracy took place), promotes the moderation of the new left across all four cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Less than four weeks after Philippine strongman Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in September 1972, Park Chung Hee did the same in South Korea. In each case, incumbent presidents with extensive executive authority claimed that harsh measures were necessary to defend their countries against a range of challenges and promote democratic foundations appropriate to national circumstances. Marcos and Park both enjoyed a strong base of power, but at the same time feared popular electoral rivals and made constitutional changes ensuring their continuance in office. The authoritarian regimes that emerged were based on a high concentration of personal authority and power, and a relatively weak role for the ruling political party. Despite these similarities, the two regimes put in place in late 1972 displayed enormous divergence in both character and outcome. Given very distinct historical foundations, the Park dictatorship was built upon a far more institutionalized civilian and military bureaucracy than was the Marcos dictatorship. Personal goals also distinguish the two dictators: while Park was obsessed with national goals of economic development, Marcos was far more concerned with promoting the economic success of his family and close associates. Through an examination of both divergent processes of state formation as well as the dynamics of each regime, this paper explores why Park’s authoritarianism?unlike that of Marcos?did not degenerate into a morass of crony capitalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using recent survey data, this paper aims to empirically investigate the state and source of Korean citizens' trust and confidence in the National Assembly. Roughly speaking, the National Assembly is trusted only by one out of ten citizens. Since the country's democratization, citizens' trust and confidence has been eroding. Presently, the National Assembly is the least trusted among the key public or private institutions. A cross-national comparison of liberal democracies in the world shows that only a few national legislatures are less trusted by their citizens than the Korean National Assembly. Furthermore, this study confirms the empirical validity of performance-based explanation about what factors generate citizens' trust and confidence in the National Assembly. At the aggregate level, an erosion of citizens' trustful attitude toward the legislature is matched by their decreased positive evaluation of the overall job performance by the legislature. At the individual level, a citizen's legislative trust and confidence depends mainly on his or her evaluation of the performance of the legislature itself, the executive interacting with it, or the democratic regime as a whole. Most Koreans pass an unfavorable judgment on the performance of the legislature, not because they think it is a simply idle institution but because politicians are seen to pursue their partisan interests too frantically within the institution. Given its drained reservoir of citizens' favorable attitudes toward it, the present National Assembly, even with its heightened constitutional status and emerging policy activism, will not be highly likely to serve as a reliable agent for facilitating democratic consolidation on Korean soil. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effects of science and technology policies upon information transfers. Such transfers are indicators of greater social returns, particularly when they flow between public and private research entities. The model presented here tests for whether government research and development (R&D) subsidization increases information flows in Korea and Taiwan. Using the unique KORTAI R&D dataset at a number of different specifications, it is shown that, at a general level, transfers are positively affected by the public funding programs in both countries. There are a number of differences between Korea and Taiwan, however, and future analysis on the East Asian developmental state must include institutions related to these funding programs. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rising anti-American sentiments in South Korea have recently been at the center of much discussion and analysis by scholars and pundits concerned about the deterioration of bilateral relations between the formerly staunch allies. Although differing in their diagnoses, most analyses agree that the current round of anti-Americanism in Korean politics is relatively new and unprecedented, shaped by a confluence of domestic and external factors. The election of President Roh Moo-hyun and his progressive cabinet has directly challenged all corners of Korean politics and society as well as conservative elites. The result has been the unleashing of fierce domestic debates on the future of Korean security, asking Koreans to choose either "alliance or self-reliance." This shift in Korean attitudes toward the U.S. is also seen as part of a new wave of anti-Americanism throughout the world, a global backlash against the hegemonic influence of the U.S. as the lone superpower with the end of the Cold War. Either attributed to a case of Korean exceptionalism or U.S. exceptionalism, the current trend of anti-Americanism in Korea is treated as a unique moment in history. In this paper, I argue instead that Korea's brand of anti-Americanism is actually a manifestation of anti-Great Power-ism, which is not new in the history of Korean politics. In fact, President Roh's election platform of finding autonomy and self-reliance demonstrates close parallels with the anti-Qing mobilization in turn-of-the-century Korea. Anti-Great Power-ism (anti-sadae) emerged as a potent tool of political mobilization in the late 19th century, when the newly created Reform/Enlightenment Party made their criticism of the existing policy of "revering Great Powers" (sadae) the centerpiece of their attack against the conservative establishment. Even though sadae was originally a pragmatic policy of accommodating the powerful Qing, marking a departure from a cultural-ideological emulation of Ming China, it was stigmatized during 19th century politics as subservient and Great Power-dependent. What we see then is the emergence and recurrence of anti-Great Power-ism as a powerful tool for political challengers in their mobilization against the established regime in Korea. By comparing the progressives' political mobilization processes in the late 19th century and in 2002-2006, I show that today's anti-Americanism is actually a continuation of anti-China-ism seen from a broader historical perspective. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Compares the strategies adopted by South Korea and Indonesia toward decolonization. Characterization of decolonization in both countries; Records of economic development and state-society relations in both countries; History of state building during decolonization in both countries.

Russia and the Republic of Korea have increasingly worked together since the early 1990's, but the relationship is not nearly so profound as the model of the U.S.-ROK security alliance. To date, both Russia and Korea have cooperated militarily and politically on a basis of mutual cooperation -- with much of the cooperation seen primarily linked to arms sales from Russia as a debt relief mechanism. Paralleling the arms sales, both countries have exchanged leader visits and cooperated bilaterally for regional military issues. This study will examine the potential benefits from increased military cooperation to strengthen regional stability -- with a view toward better drawing on Russia's potential partner role in future regional political and military security fora to complement the already strong relationship between the United States and Korea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What is a ?perfect dictatorship?? Such a regime provokes little societal resistance at installation. Its leaders act jointly to consolidate the regime and to broaden the support coalition by agreeing upon succession rules to rotate the presidency within the authoritarian regime. They delegate policy-making authority to civilians in areas of their competence. They emphasize consultation, not open contestation, prefer cooptation to repression, eschew ideological appeals, compel social actors into regime-licensed organizations, and deactivate civil society. South Korea under Park Chung Hee is compared on these dimensions to Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico, all at a time when authoritarian regimes governed them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On December 30, 2004, the Korean government succeeded in reaching an agreement that Korea continues the quota system in the rice market until 2014 on the stipulation that the Minimum Market Access quota be increased gradually from 4% as of 2004 to 7.96% of the total consumption of rice by 2014. We have found, however, that if the Korean government decided to introduce the tariff system instead, the social welfare would increase by 1,578 billion won (in 2000 constant price) over the next ten years, even after accounting for the decrease in the multi-functional values of rice farming. Because such a decision cannot be justified in terms of economic efficiency, we look into the political environments surrounding the rice market polices: the activities of the agricultural interest groups, the pattern of interaction between farmer groups, the policy agencies, and the legislative, and the public opinion on the rice market policy. We conclude that the decision resulted neither from the militant protests by farmer interest groups nor from the reliable alliance among the farmer groups, the policy agencies, and the legislative; rather it stemmed from the threat of negative election campaign by the farmer groups and the public opinion of urban residents sympathetic with protecting the rice market. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to a survey of 178 states' internet accessibility by the United Nations' International Telecommunication Union (ITU), South Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan ranked in the top ten, but China, the Philippines, and Indonesia placed outside the top fifty. Despite efforts to reduce this chasm by governments and international organizations, the digital gap between those who have and those don't have continues to widen particularly in Asia. In an attempt to smooth out differentials of the Digital Access Index among Asian nations, the ITU and other international organizations encouraged government-sponsored initiatives to broaden accessibility. Thus the South Korean government, NGOs, and major electronics companies such as Samsung and LG have been supporting the digital have-nots within the region to construct basic IT infrastructures. Two questions arise: why are South Korea's grants centralized around Asia, and do the efforts focus on hardware? A hypothesis to the first question is that the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997 made the general public in South Korea realize that Asian countries are closely related in their history, geography, culture, politics, and economy. Moreover, policy makers comprehended that narrowing the digital divide is essential for the sustainable development of South Korea. Secondly, there are two aspects of the contributions of South Korea's Official Development Assistance (ODA.) The material aspect is supporting of infrastructures to increase access for rural or remote areas and human resources development. The South Korean government and companies are helping to build a digital network; NGOs and volunteer ICT experts educate government officers in underdeveloped countries using software, and develop localized content. Many of them share the basic assumption that their efforts will bring to Korea political and economic advantages someday. For example, the ICT Hub that links regional key players and major institutions can be regional influence. The ethical aspect comes from the special experience of the Korean economy. As late as the early 1960s, Korea was one of the poorest countries in the world; South Korea was an ODA recipient until 1991. However, in 2005, South Korea became the 11th biggest contributor due to rapid economic development, especially in the information technology field. South Korea's experience, therefore, can be a good lesson for today's developing Asian nations. This argument is supported by documentation from the 1990's, governmental websites, newspapers/periodicals, and journals from Asian communities, and should be compared with prior works including Hans-Dieter Evers (2005) and Robert Hunter Wade (2002). South Korean annual assistance would be analyzed by regional and sectoral priorities before and after 1997. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]