Seoul Ambition

Seoul Ambition is the remarkable story of how the nation of South Korea—despite its infamous obsession with academics—focuses feverishly on sports in ways much different than what we’re used to in the West. South Korean athletes dominate leaderboards in international golf events and have won the most Olympic medals of all-time in archery and short track speed skating. The country has produced transcendent talents in figure skating and the budding arena of esports, creating a seemingly never-ending pipeline of children who want to emulate their success. Yet, the talent development process in Korea presents an interesting conundrum. Though all young athletes pour in hours of practice, Korean athletes traditionally only become world class in a select few niche sports. One victory from a 20-year-old golfer caused one of the greatest talent rushes in modern sports, but a captivating World Cup run in men’s soccer did not. In fact, Son Heung-min, the most dynamic Korean soccer player of all time, actually had to rebel against the system to become a creative genius. What is happening behind the scenes? After spending years as a coach and physical education teacher in Seoul, author Joel Cressman set out to answer that question. Seoul Ambition explores the amazing stories of: • A young baseball prodigy who taught himself how to throw left-handed to become one of the most accurate Major League pitchers of all time • How South Korea intentionally used East Germany as a model to win more medals and the ideological battle over North Korea • An educational system that pushes athletes to focus full-time on their sports while ignoring academics to get into top universities • Why the Korean Basketball League banned tall players to help save the sport • The story and the surprising neuroscience behind how Korea became the global hotbed of professional video gaming • The misconceptions of “Tiger Parenting” and how a hands-on parenting style is viewed differently by East Asian children than Western kids • Why the country’s best speed skater was forced to defect to Russia • How the national men’s and women’s hockey teams willed themselves from obscurity to compete with the world’s best at the 2018 Olympics Full of extraordinary stories of athletes and their dedicated parents, the book explores the science and history behind one of the most interesting sports cultures in the world. Seoul Ambition will change the way you think about talent and creativity, the power of community and national identity, and the fascinating process of creating world-class athletes.

This book examines the first regional strategy of South Korea toward Southeast Asia and India. At issue is how a middle power (a G20 country with the tenth largest economy in the world) seeks to play a larger and more comprehensive role in regions beyond the Korean peninsula. Hitherto, South Korean foreign policy has focused on nuclearizing North Korea, alliance maintenance with the United States, tricky relations with its most important economic partner China, and difficult ties with Japan marred by historical and territorial disputes. The Moon Administration has sought to diversify South Korean foreign policy by elevating ASEAN and India to the same strategic level as the United States, China, Russia, and Japan. To be sure, the latter countries continue to be most significant to the Korean peninsula. However, this book offers different country and regional perspectives on Seoul’s first regional grand strategy to play a role commensurate with its status as a middle power.

The book compares different approaches to urban development in Singapore and Seoul over the past decades, by focusing on community participation in the transformation of neighbourhoods and its impact on the built environment and communal life. Singapore and Seoul are known for their rapid economic growth and urbanisation under a strong control of developmental state in the past. However, these cities are at a critical crossroads of societal transformation, where participatory and community-based urban development is gaining importance. This new approach can be seen as a result of a changing relationship between the state and civil society, where an emerging partnership between both aims to overcome the limitations of earlier urban development. The book draws attention to the possibilities and challenges that these cities face while moving towards a more inclusive and socially sustainable post-developmental urbanisation. By applying a comparative perspective to understand the evolving urban paradigms in Singapore and Seoul, this unique and timely book offers insights for scholars, professionals and students interested in contemporary Asian urbanisation and its future trajectories.

Since the end of the Cold War, South Korea has taken on a greater role in global affairs. Ramon Pacheco Pardo provides a groundbreaking analysis of South Korea’s foreign policy from its transition to democracy in the late 1980s through the present day, arguing that the country’s approach to the world constitutes a grand strategy. This book examines the key factors and goals that shape South Korea’s long-term strategy, with analysis that brings together its diplomatic, military, economic, and soft-power components. Pacheco Pardo shows that South Korea’s fundamental aim has been to move beyond its past as a “shrimp among whales” and instead attain autonomy and freedom of action. He explores how South Korean leaders across parties and governments have pursued security, prosperity, and status. Pacheco Pardo tracks South Korea’s core relationships with North Korea, the United States, and China, and he details the country’s objectives and policies across East Asia, the Asia-Pacific region, and the rest of the world. Drawing on in-depth interviews with past and present policy makers, this book presents an analytical account of how South Korean strategy is made and practiced. It expertly lays out South Korea’s grand strategy and, more broadly, makes a compelling case that middle powers like South Korea can implement grand strategies.

But in general, Reiss suggests, nuclear weapons may have come to be viewed as expensive and dangerous anachronisms.

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.

This book sheds light on one of the most under-studied but powerful navies in the world. Using a multifaceted approach, it examines how the Republic of Korea Navy (ROKN) has sought to transform itself from a coastal naval force focused solely on deterring North Korea to a navy capable of operating in the blue waters of East Asia and beyond. The project argues that peninsular and regional security dynamics, technological developments, the US-South Korea alliance and internal politics combine to inform and shape ROKN modernisation.