The Korea Herald

[Trinh Thanh Thuy] Focus on people to build smart communities and cities

Nov 26, 2018

People are talking industry 4.0 and 5.0, but in these efforts to build a smart digital environment, there is a serious lack of attention to those on the ground, or more accurately, to measures for improving the lives of the poor and destitute.Even with the recent adoption of the ASEAN Smart Cities Framework by ASEAN leaders in Singapore, with its promise “that no one is left behind,” the focus is mainly on the “urban centers.”Meanwhile at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in P
[Michael Schuman] Trump is doing China a favor

Nov 26, 2018

Prospects for a trade deal between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the upcoming Group of 20 meeting in Argentina are quite likely to founder on the question of China’s industrial strategies: While Beijing may be willing to buy more American goods to mollify Trump, it almost certainly won’t stop supporting sectors it sees as key to China’s technological and economic progress.In fact, China would be much wiser to scale back its industrial policies now. They could well
[Noah Smith] Can Democrats save capitalism?

Nov 26, 2018

With the Democrats having retaken the House of Representatives, and with socialists gaining more clout within the Democratic Party, the US is awakening to the reality of a reinvigorated left. Long decades of increasing inequality have taken some of the shine off of capitalism, and the disappointment wrought by the Great Recession seems to have been a catalyst for a socialist resurgence.But a big question looms in the background: What kind of new system does the left want?There are two basic alte
[Therese Raphael] A Thelma and Louise Brexit? You know the ending

Nov 26, 2018

Committed Brexiters have arrived at the conclusion that the deal Prime Minister Theresa May has negotiated is not just bad; it’s worse than remaining in the European Union. That’s axiomatic. But what’s their plan? It’s not to cancel Brexit. And it’s not to hold a new public vote.Their preference appears to be for what they call a “managed” no-deal Brexit. The pitch is that this isn’t the catastrophic crash-out business fears, but a brisk exit to World Trade Organization rules, with key risks mit
[Nisha Gopalan] Everything’s great in China’s economy. By decree

Nov 26, 2018

Consumers of brokerage research on China’s economy and companies have long known that they need to read between the lines. Securities firms are often circumspect in their judgments to avoid alienating powerful interests that could damage their business.So it’s curious that the head securities regulator went to the trouble of meeting with more than 30 brokerages and fund firms to admonish them to be careful in what they say. Liu Shiyu, chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, told
[David Ignatius] Trump should use next week’s G20 summit to find a trade victory with China

Nov 25, 2018

If President Trump is the dealmaker he claims to be, he should use the upcoming G20 summit in Buenos Aires to declare a win in his trade war with China -- before his bombast does any more damage to the global economy.Trade is Trump’s signature issue. But more than a year after he began threatening tariffs on major trading partners, he has relatively little to show for it. The improvements in NAFTA are modest, at best. The US economy hasn’t suffered significantly, but global growth is beginning t
[Kent Harrington, John Walcott] How Kim has played Trump

Nov 25, 2018

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is eager to hold a second summit with US President Donald Trump. Since their first meeting in Singapore in June, Kim has consistently outmaneuvered his counterpart. Trump may still fancy himself a world-class deal maker, but the truth is that Kim -- like Russian President Vladimir Putin -- has got Trump’s number.Kim’s bonhomie -- real or feigned -- and promises of denuclearization have muted Trump’s threats, brought the South Korean government closer to his side
[Jack Fruchtman] Under Trump, is jail next for journalists?

Nov 25, 2018

The press is under serious attack, but not only because President Donald Trump prefers to call it “the enemy of the people” and revoke credentials at will. Waiting in the wings may well be prison terms.Between 1917 and 2009, only one person was convicted of violating the Espionage Act for leaking classified information to the press. Then the Obama administration came along and prosecuted eight government whistleblowers at a far higher rate than those undertaken by all previous presidential admin
[Hussein Ibish] Saudi king gets a pass on Khashoggi. Why?

Nov 25, 2018

One of the central figures in the drama over the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi has remained an invisible man. Global attention has focused on the role played by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the Oct. 2 killing at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. But another figure deserves equal billing: the prince’s father, King Salman.The crown prince is often referred to as the “de facto ruler” of Saudi Arabia. But that’s not what he really is. The king has virtually total power. He h
[Leonid Bershidsky] How to protect Interpol

Nov 25, 2018

The election of South Korean Kim Jong-yang as president of Interpol put an end to fears that the global police cooperation organization would fall under the control of Russian President Vladimir Putin. But the controversy surrounding the election lays bare a more important issue: How does one keep international organizations inclusive without leaving them open to abuse?Last week, the Times of London named Russian police general Alexander Prokopchuk the front-runner in the Interpol election made
[David Ignatius] A Thanksgiving wish: Slow it down

Nov 22, 2018

Here‘s a simple four-word wish for Thanksgiving 2018 -- a day when most of us take a break from the blurring, dizzying speed of our internet world: Let’s slow things down.I don‘t just mean stopping to smell the roses, or taking a hike in the woods, or hiding our screens for a few hours. I mean, literally: Slow down the circuits. Put more friction in the system. Make social media slower, more local and less instantly connected to people we don’t know. Our hyper-fast world has become destructive.
[Timothy L. O’Brien] Ivanka’s email scandal has a familiar moral

Nov 22, 2018

Ivanka Trump used her personal email account last year to handle as many as 100 discussions of official White House matters. If that doesn’t strike you as a rather ironic turn of events then fine-tune your antennae by looking up any old online video of her father threatening to put Hillary Clinton in jail for using a private email server, calling on Russian hackers to find her missing emails, or praising the FBI for reopening an investigation of the former secretary of state’s “criminal and ille
[Hal Brands] America’s secret weapon against China: Democracy

Nov 22, 2018

In his speech at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit over the weekend, Vice President Mike Pence put the clash of political values between the US and China at the heart of the clash of geopolitical interests between the two countries. Pence declared that America seeks a “free Indo-Pacific” where countries and individuals can “exercise their God-given liberties”; he touted Washington‘s progress in deepening its relationships with the region’s democracies. Pence contrasted this approach w
[Richard McGregor] Xi ignored private enterprise. Now he needs it

Nov 22, 2018

After more than five years in power, Xi Jinping has constructed a singular political persona: of a leader who places the Communist Party and its authority above all, on top of the state, the economy and military.So it may have come as a surprise to see Xi usher China’s top entrepreneurs into Beijing’s Great Hall of the People earlier this month to offer them reassuring bromides about their importance for the country’s economy. “All private companies and private entrepreneurs should feel totally
[Leonid Bershidsky] Germany doesn’t really want an EU army

Nov 22, 2018

For all the recent debate about creating a joint European army, Germany -- which has the second-biggest military in the European Union -- has little interest in setting up any kind of supranational force under the EU’s command. This reluctance is key to understanding the ineffectiveness of all the bloc’s existing military projects.In a recent op-ed for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen laid out her vision of “an army of the Europeans” -- note the ch