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[International Center for Korean Studies of Kyujanggak Institute] The 6th Book Talk Series - North Korea’s Foreign Policy: The Kim Jong-Un Regime in a Hostile World

Sep 14, 2023

Dear All,

The International Center for Korean Studies of Kyujanggak Institute is hosting a Book Talk series, introducing North Korea’s Foreign Policy: The Kim Jong-Un Regime in a Hostile World edited by Scott A. Snyder and Kyung-Ae Park.

Title: North Korea’s Foreign Policy: The Kim Jong-Un Regime in a Hostile World
Date: September 14 (Thursday) 15:00-16:30
Venue: Kyujanggak Conference Room (4F)
Speakers: Scott A. Snyder (CFR) & Kyung-Ae Park (UBC)
Moderator: Seong-Ho Sheen (SNU GSIS)

About the Editors:
Scott A. Snyder is senior fellow for Korea studies and director of the program on U.S.-Korea policy at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). His program examines South Korea’s efforts to contribute on the international stage; its potential influence and contributions as a middle power in East Asia; and the peninsular, regional, and global implications of North Korean instability. Mr. Snyder is the coeditor of North Korea's Foreign Policy: The Kim Jong-un Regime in a Hostile World (January 2023) with Kyung-Ae Park, author of South Korea at the Crossroads: Autonomy and Alliance in an Era of Rival Powers (January 2018), coauthor of Domestic Constraints on South Korean Foreign Policy (January 2018) with Geun Lee, Young Ho Kim, and Jiyoon Kim, and coauthor of The Japan-South Korea Identity Clash: East Asian Security and the United States (May 2015) with Brad Glosserman. Mr. Snyder served as the project director for CFR’s Independent Task Force on policy toward the Korean Peninsula. He currently writes for the blog Asia Unbound.
Prior to joining CFR, Mr. Snyder was a senior associate in the international relations program of the Asia Foundation, where he founded and directed the Center for U.S.-Korea Policy and served as the Asia Foundation’s representative in Korea (2000?2004). He was also a senior associate at Pacific Forum Center for Strategic and International Studies. Mr. Snyder has worked as an Asia specialist in the research and studies program of the U.S. Institute of Peace and as acting director of Asia Society’s contemporary affairs program. He was a Pantech visiting fellow at Stanford University’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center during 2005?2006, and received an Abe fellowship, administered by the Social Sciences Research Council, in 1998?1999. Mr. Snyder has provided advice to nongovernmental and humanitarian organizations active in North Korea and serves on the advisory council of the National Committee on North Korea.
Mr. Snyder received a BA from Rice University and an MA from the regional studies East Asia program at Harvard University. He was a Thomas G. Watson fellow at Yonsei University in South Korea.

Kyung-Ae Park is Professor in the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs (SPPGA) and holds the Korea Foundation Chair at the Institute of Asian Research, the University of British Columbia (UBC). She is a former President of the Association of Korean Political Studies in North America.
Professor Park is the author, co-author, and editor of many scholarly publications on issues ranging from North and South Korean politics and foreign relations to gender and development, including North Korea in Transition: Politics, Economics, and SocietyNon-Traditional Security Issues in North KoreaNew Challenges of North Korean Foreign PolicyKorean Security Dynamics in Transition, and China and North Korea: Politics of Integration and Modernization. She has also authored articles in a number of journals, including Comparative PoliticsJournal of Asian StudiesPacific AffairsAsian Survey, and Pacific Review.
Since the mid-1990s, she has made several trips to Pyongyang and hosted North Korean delegation visits to Canada, playing a key role in promoting Track-II exchanges and diplomacy between Canada and North Korea. She established the Canada-DPRK Knowledge Partnership Program at UBC, which has been hosting North Korean professors as part of a long-term knowledge exchange and thus represents an unprecedented, ground-breaking program in North America.

About the Book:
Since Kim Jong-un’s assumption of power in December 2011, North Korea has undergone expanded nuclear development, political isolation, and economic stagnation. Kim’s early prioritization of the byungjin policy, simultaneous economic and military or nuclear development, highlighted his goal of transforming North Korea’s domestic economic circumstances and strengthening its position in the world as a nuclear state. The central dilemma shaping Kim Jong-un’s foreign policy throughout his first decade in power revolves around ensuring North Korea’s prosperity and security while sustaining the political isolation and control necessary for regime survival. In order to evaluate North Korea’s foreign policy under Kim, this volume will examine the impact of domestic factors that have influenced the formation and implementation of Kim’s foreign policy, Kim’s distinctive use of summitry and effectiveness of such meetings as an instrument by which to attain foreign policy goals, and the impact of international responses to North Korea’s pursuit of nuclear capabilities on North Korea’s foreign policy.

This lecture is an in-person event conducted in English. Please refer to the following links for registration.
- Register here: https://forms.gle/LDDQSGSVVCSeo7fk6

Please contact icks@snu.ac.kr (Tel. 02-880-9378) for more information.