Korean Affairs

Against the backdrop of China’s mounting influence and North Korea’s growing nuclear capability and expanding missile arsenal, South Korea faces a set of strategic choices that will shape its economic prospects and national security. In South Korea at the Crossroads, Scott A. Snyder examines the trajectory of fifty years of South Korean foreign policy and offers predictions—and a prescription—for the future. Pairing a historical perspective with a shrewd understanding of today’s political landscape, Snyder contends that South Korea’s best strategy remains investing in a robust alliance with the United States. Snyder begins with South Korea’s effort in the 1960s to offset the risk of abandonment by the United States during the Vietnam War and the subsequent crisis in the alliance during the 1970s. A series of shifts in South Korean foreign relations followed: the “Nordpolitik” engagement with the Soviet Union and China at the end of the Cold War; Kim Dae Jung’s “Sunshine Policy,” designed to bring North Korea into the international community; “trustpolitik,” which sought to foster diplomacy with North Korea and Japan; and changes in South Korea’s relationship with the United States. Despite its rise as a leader in international financial, development, and climate-change forums, South Korea will likely still require the commitment of the United States to guarantee its security. Although China is a tempting option, Snyder argues that only the United States is both credible and capable in this role. South Korea remains vulnerable relative to other regional powers in northeast Asia despite its rising profile as a middle power, and it must balance the contradiction of desirable autonomy and necessary alliance.

These essays support the argument that strong and effective presidential leadership is the most important prerequisite for South Korea to sustain and project its influence abroad. That leadership should be attentive to the need for public consensus and should operate within established legislative mechanisms that ensure public accountability. The underlying structures sustaining South Korea’s foreign policy formation are generally sound; the bigger challenge is to manage domestic politics in ways that promote public confidence about the direction and accountability of presidential leadership in foreign policy.

In the 20th century, South Korea was usually seen as a "shrimp amongst whales", a minor player with limited agency in regional and global affairs. Korea’s risen status as a "middle power" today, however, begs the question about related changes in the South Korean identity or "sense of self" in the world. In this book, Patrick Flamm presents the first comprehensive and agency oriented empirical account of South Korean international state identity and Seoul’s global foreign policy in the 21st century. Advancing a performative and narrative understanding of identity in International Relations, Flamm uses South Korea’s global engagement in peacekeeping and climate diplomacy to offer much-needed insight into the various identity narratives and role conceptions at play. In the case of peacekeeping and climate diplomacy, South Korea’s identity as an international actor has been dominated by practices of self-identification that position the country at the brink of advanced countries, aspiring to lead the rest of the world but with the overall objective to maintain national autonomy in a changing regional and global context. South Korean Identity and Global Foreign Policy is a must-read for scholars of International Relations, Foreign Policy Analysis and Asian/Korean Studies.

The Routledge Handbook of Europe–Korea Relations provides a comprehensive overview of the changing dynamics in relations between Europe and Korea, provided by leading experts in the field. Informed by high-quality academic research and key trilateral data and statistics, this book brings scope, balance, and depth, with wide-ranging coverage examining the history of Europe-Korea relations, the Cold War, contemporary Europe-Korea and Europe-North Korea relations, Europe and inter-Korea relations within the regional context, and relations between European countries and the Korea. Through this approach, it increases awareness of the extent and intensity of the multi-faceted and multi-layered connections between the Europe and Korea. Finally, it proposes a way forward for a future relationship between Europe and the Koreas. As a key reference point, for advanced-level students, researchers, policy-makers and journalists producing, and consuming, new material in the area and beyond, it provides an essential understanding of both the historical backdrop to, and the current crisis in, this troubled peninsula. This Handbook will be an essential reference for scholars, students, researchers and practitioners interested and working in the fields of Asian Politics/ Studies, EU Politics/Studies, European Politics/Studies, Korean Politics/Studies and International Relations. The Routledge Handbook of Europe–Korea Relations is part of the mini-series Europe in the World Handbooks examining EU-regional relations.