South Korea is the 16th-largest donor country, spending US$3 billion on official development assistance (ODA) in 2020. Korea is known to be the first country successfully transformed from a least developed country to an OECD DAC member country. The talk initially focuses on the question how Korea has managed foreign aid to establish a foundation to take a giant leap forward in economic development as the effective use of foreign aid has made the country a good example of catalyzing socio-economic development. Then, current landscape of Korea’s foreign aid will be presented with regard to foreign aid governance, focused countries and areas, and aid modalities. 

Dr. Nelson joined the faculty at the University of Missouri in 1967 after finishing his B.S. and M.S. degrees at the University of Minnesota, a Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin and a post-doctoral at Cornell University. He focused his research career on forage and pasture plants while mentoring 28 graduate students and 21 post-docs leading to over 250 refereed journal articles, about 40 book chapters and being editor/author of nine books. He was elected President of the Crop Science Society of America, the American Society of Agronomy and led formation of the International Crop Science Society. But that was the foundation for the future, and especially after “retirement” in 2005.  

Why North Korea?     

In 1985 Nelson made his first of 42 visits to South Korea to work with scientists and strengthen agricultural relationships with the University of Missouri. In addition, he had extended and repeated professional visits to more than 30 countries in East Europe, Africa, East Asia and in India to assist with agriculture and food issues. Throughout, the scientists in South Korea urged him to become engaged with assistance to the DPRK since they wanted to share technical and practical knowledge to indirectly, at least, assist the North in feeding its people.  

From 2000, he began assisting the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) by hosting several extended week-long training programs for agricultural research delegations from the DPRK. In 2005, he and other University of Missouri agricultural scientists and some South Korean scientists met with DPRK scientists in Yanji, China for an intensive workshop. He participated several years with AAAS on programs with the DPRK and was invited several times for conferences in Seoul that were supported by the Korea Sharing Movement. These interactions eventually led to four week-long visits with AFSC to the DPRK to visit farms, give seminars and discuss potentials for joint programs with the Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Pyongyang. He hosted a highly successful training program in Missouri for four Academy soil scientists for 23 days in late 2011. The soil testing program in the DPRK was improved by applying the new knowledge. And then the regime changed. 

Despite repeated attempts through help and associations with the National Committee on North Korea, nearly all communication with the North ended with the change in leadership to Kim Jung Un. Proposals were submitted, but no more visits were allowed. Subsequently, The University of Missouri proposed to conduct 2-to 3-week training programs for Academy scientists at the Cuu Long Rice Research Center in Vietnam, but again proposals to the DPRK were denied. The question was what could be done from the outside? During late 2019 and early 2020 Nelson organized a working group of agricultural scientists at the University of Missouri, Seoul National University and key Research Institutes in South Korea to write a book on “Current Status of Agriculture and Forestry in North Korea”.  

Unfortunately, the COVID-19 challenges slowed progress on the book. Yet, the book is critical since many groups want to help the DPRK improve its food security, but have little technical understanding of the current practices, limitations of natural resources, and changing climate effects on agriculture and forestry. Dietary shortfalls and relationships with health and sustainable food production are fundamental to food security in the DPRK and need guidelines in agriculture to improve the situation. The current sanctions are having effects on food and the people in the DPRK and production is gradually decreasing. The shortages will take several decades of restoration and adoption of new technology to gradually enhance production capacity to approach self-sufficiency and be in harmony with “Juche” as a national goal. 

The purpose of this lecture is to give a brief introduction to the recent history of Korean Democracy by explaining Professor Sandel’s popularity in Korea. Up to 2010 Professor Sandel was known to Korean scholars for his famous lecture ‘Justice’ at Harvard University. In April 2010 his book <Justice> was translated into Korean and saw tremendous success, selling a million copies in just a year. This was during one of the most corrupt presidencies the country has seen, awakening the Korean people’s sensitivity for justice and fairness. Most of Professor Sandel’s books were subsequently translated, almost all of them becoming bestsellers. This popularity significantly affected the candle rallies of 2016~2017 which led to a change in Korea’s regime. His recent book, <The Tyranny of Merit>, now draws the Korean people’s attention to the real meaning of fairness by criticizing meritocracy in global contemporary societies. This lecture will examine the impact Sandel’s political philosophy had on the Korean People’s democratic consciousness, and how it made them rethink true democratic values, such as the true meaning of freedom that the people in the Covid-19 era may depend on. 

In July 2015, Archivist of the United States David S. Ferriero announced Dr. Kurt Graham’s appointment as the Director of the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and Museum. Dr. Graham has extensive experience in the library/museum world. He directed the McCracken Research Library at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody, Wyoming. As director, he orchestrated the digitization of some of the Library’s most important archival collections, oversaw the physical renovation of the Library’s public spaces, managed the Center’s fellowship program, and launched a documentary editing project, The Papers of William F. Cody. He left Cody to direct the Church History Museum in Salt Lake City in 2010, where he spearheaded the development and redesign of the museum’s principal history exhibit, which included several significant multi-media components. 

Prior to his work in the public history field, Dr. Graham was a member of the history faculty at California State University, San Bernardino, where he taught undergraduate and graduate courses in American political and legal/constitutional history. He has a Ph.D. in American history from Brown University and a B.A. and an M.A. from Brigham Young University in English and American studies, respectively. He is the author of To Bring Law Home: The Federal Judiciary in Early National Rhode Island (Northern Illinois University Press, 2010). He lives with his wife and family in Blue Springs, Missouri. 

How many exceptions to the norm do there need to be before we start questioning the norm?  For the last forty years, scholars have been uncovering and telling the stories of powerful queens, noblewomen, abbesses and female saints who profoundly influenced the culture around them during the period between 500-1500, sometimes still erroneously referred to as the “Dark Ages.”  So while we know more than ever before about how individual women influenced political, economic, religious, and cultural change, too often their stories are still presented as “exceptions” to the rule that women in the premodern world were silent, invisible, and irrelevant to the development of their societies.  This presentation will not only introduce you to some remarkable women, but it will also challenge you to accept a new paradigm that sees females in positions of power as accepted, expected, and totally unremarkable in the medieval world.  The presentation focuses on, but will not exclusively cover, the continent of Europe. 

About the speaker

Dr. Lois Huneycutt is an award-winning teacher who received her PhD in medieval history and the history of Christianity from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her research focuses on women and power, and women and religious change. She is the author of Matilda of Scotland: A Study in Medieval Queenship, as well as two dozen scholarly articles.  She is currently working on a second monograph entitled The Empress Matilda and Matilda of Boulogne: Queenship During the English Civil War of 1135-1152. 

Differences in the way of negotiating with North Korea: bottom-up and top-down 

Even after the 2020 U.S. presidential election, the stance of the U.S. policy to denuclearize North Korea is expected to remain. This is because President Trump has maintained a policy of engagement with North Korea, and Democratic Party candidate Biden also sympathizes with solving the North Korean nuclear issue through diplomatic dialogue. However, depending on who occupies the White House through this presidential election, the speed and negotiation method between North Korea and the United States are expected to change significantly. 

If President Trump succeeds in re-election, it is expected that North American negotiations will continue through a top-down method. After the burden of re-election has disappeared, President Trump is expected to be more active in achieving his diplomatic achievements in order to remain a historically recognized great president, as did other predecessors. President Trump, who expects to win the Nobel Prize by resolving the North Korean nuclear issue that threatens the security of the United States, will have a tremendous political achievement, saying, “We have solved a challenge that former President Obama could not have done.”  

In addition, in the case of the Trump administration, a move to resume negotiations with North Korea will begin in earnest from the beginning of next year, as Steven Biegun’s negotiation team with North Korea has already been active. But there are other scenarios as well. From the standpoint of President Trump, who succeeded in re-election, if Chairman Kim Jong-un does not actively pursue denuclearization, some changes are expected in the policy of repeating the summit meetings promoted in the first period of power. 

Meanwhile, North Korea will promptly propose to the White House to resume negotiations with North Korea if President Trump is re-elected. In addition, considering President Trump’s position that North Korea does not cross the red line as the Maginot line of negotiations, North Korea will not show off its improved ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile) capabilities to enhance its bargaining power ahead of the resumption of negotiations with the US. 

On the other hand, if the Democratic Party’s candidate Biden is elected, it is expected that the policy stance toward North Korea will be maintained through diplomatic means to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue in general terms. Candidate Biden also sympathized with the resolution of the North Korean problem through dialogue, and said that if he was elected, he would meet with Chairman Kim Jong-un if certain conditions were met. However, it is expected that there will be serious differentiation from the Trump administration in the specific way of negotiating with the US. 

In particular, ABT (Anything But Trump) policy will be promoted in foreign policy including North Korea, China and Russia. Regarding the North Korean approach, Candidate Biden criticized President Trump for failing to make substantial progress in denuclearization at a summit meeting with Chairman Kim Jong-un and only giving legitimacy. He said he would not continue personal diplomacy between the leaders of North America if he was elected. 

Considering the fact that during the past year there has been a harsh battle between Candidate Biden and the Pyongyang regime, such as a “gangster,” it is expected that a considerable amount of adjustment time will be required to establish a trust relationship between the leaders of the North and the United States when Biden is elected.  

President Trump’s top-down negotiations with North Korea will be revised. The Biden administration’s policy toward North Korea will be promoted through practical negotiations. If practical negotiations make progress, it is expected to return to a bottom-up method that raises the level of negotiations. Specifically, considering the fact that the US administration has a channel for direct communication with North Korea, bilateral negotiations between the United States and North Korea will proceed through close consultations with allies such as South Korea and Japan, rather than multilateral negotiations such as the past six-party talks. 

In addition, considering that it will take approximately six months for the new US administration to form a cabinet, the US preparations for the resumption of US-North Korea negotiations will not materialize until next summer. On the other hand, from the standpoint of North Korea, a certain amount of time is likely to be required considering that a trust relationship between the two leaders has not been established and that the personal composition and position of the US side in negotiations may change. 

The next US administration has no choice but to focus on domestic issues such as the fiscal deficit and economic recovery caused by the Corona 19 incident. The United States needs a justification for early North American negotiations to resume. If preemptive measures to prove North Korea’s willingness to denuclearize do not come out of Pyongyang, it will not be easy for the North Korean issue to attract attention in the early days of the Biden administration. Paradoxically, this situation shows that North Korea is likely to show off its improved ICBM capabilities to attract the attention of the Biden administration and increase the ransom. 

About the speaker

Dr. Sung-wook Nam is an East Asia expert with the theoretical and practical experience in academia, government and intelligence services on North Korea and China. He has worked as an analyst for Korean National Intelligence Service and an advisor to Ministry of National Defense, Ministry of National Unification and Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 

Nam is Dean of Graduate School of Public Policy, Korea University and director of Center for North Koreanology at the Asiatic Research Institute, Korea University since 2013. He received his PhD in Applied Economics from the University of Missouri-Columbia, USA. He also works as a commentator on international affairs at the Korea Broadcasting Service since 2008. His academic career includes four years as Professor of North Korean Studies at Ewha Women’s University and five years as the head of the School of National Intelligence Academy. 

His positions in the government since entering academia in 1999 include the President of Institute for National Security Strategy in 2008–2011. Also, he was the general director of National Unification Council Advisory (vice-minister level) in 2012–2013. In addition to numerous papers and books, he is the author of North Korean Food Shortage and Reform of Collective Farm (Munchen Germany: Hertze Verlag, 2006). He is the author of North Korean Nuclear Weapon and Reunification of the Korean Peninsula (Singapore: World Scientific, 2019). He is co-author of South Korea’s 70-Year Endeavor for Foreign Policy, National Defense, and Unification (Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018) and also Mysterious Pyoungyang: Beauty of Women and Cosmetics (Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020).  

One of the remaining weaknesses in neuroscience relates to the lack of understanding the nature of the self. This presentation will provide a neuropsychological model that suggests that the right hemisphere association area integrates sensory experiences and mental experiences into a “sense of self” (which is experienced as a sense of “mineness”) that serves as the foundation for many human character traits and experiences that have been difficult to explain to date. “Disorders of the self” will be reviewed to support/explain the model, in which individuals with brain dysfunction exhibit conditions in which they deny parts of their physical body as belonging to the self (asomatognosia) or as their own thoughts as being theirs (schizophrenia). This model also has relevance for human behaviors as it suggests that activation of this sense of self leads to virtues such as empathy (experiencing the thoughts and emotions of others as “mine”), and inhibition of this process leads to selfless transcendent experiences which are interpreted differently based on cultural/religious perspectives (e.g., unio mystico, Brahman/atman, no self). Examples are provided to show how different cultures manifest this sense of self differently, including Western individualistic cultures which promote the self, and Eastern collectivist cultures which promote a broader sense of self (i.e., self as family, others, community, property, environment).