The Korea Herald

[David Ignatius] Trump has squandered opportunity his populist campaign offered

Jan 17, 2019

US President Donald Trump is giving an unintentional gift to the burgeoning field of Democratic presidential candidates: He is teaching them how they can win.Trump’s failure as president is that he hasn’t forged a governing party that can unite the country, pass legislation and address America’s problems. He has succeeded in creating an insurgency that has toppled the traditional Republican establishment and intimidated Republican Party members of Congress into stunned, appalled silence. But wit
[David Lubin] How US monetary policy has tamed China

Jan 17, 2019

Chinese leaders do like their slogans, and where foreign policy is concerned, two have reflected Beijing’s thinking in recent times. The first is the cautious principle of tao guang yang hui, usually rendered in English as “hide your light and bide your time,” which guided Chinese policy for decades after Deng Xiaoping established it in the 1980s. In late 2013, though, President Xi Jinping coined a new slogan to define a more assertive, muscular approach: fen fa you wei, or “strive for achieveme
[Kim Myong-sik] Why not scrap faulty campaign pledges?

Jan 16, 2019

During the 2017 presidential election following the exit of Park Geun-hye, candidate Moon Jae-in promised the relocation of the presidential office to the central Seoul location of Gwanghwamun from its secluded present position. A year and seven months after he won the election, President Moon scrapped the plan.His campaigners said Cheong Wa Dae was too big and its area too wide to serve as an effective workplace for the chief executive of the state. Compared to the White House in Washington, El
[Ana Palacio] Transatlantic leadership void

Jan 16, 2019

Transatlantic security today looks a lot like a ghost plane. With the “crew” incapacitated -- that is, bereft of ideas or leadership -- it is flying on autopilot until it inevitably hits something or runs out of fuel and comes crashing down. To avoid disaster, those in the cockpit need to wake up -- and soon.Since the end of World War II, the United States, as the dominant European (and world) power, has piloted transatlantic security. But under President Donald Trump, the US isn’t doing much le
[Therese Raphael] Theresa May’s humbling offers a glimmer of hope

Jan 16, 2019

It was both a historic vote and a decisive defeat for the government. But while it was called a “meaningful vote,” parliament’s verdict on Theresa May’s Brexit deal Tuesday was actually anything but.Tuesday’s ballot was all about tactics; not one MP thought it would decide anything. As the prime minister noted herself afterward, it makes clear what parliament doesn’t want, but not what alternative can garner a majority among lawmakers. As such, it has left all factions even more entrenched.Remai
[Noah Smith] China’s growth machine no longer looks unstoppable

Jan 16, 2019

China’s economy is slowing. The downturn may be the result of recent events -- the trade war with the US, or retrenchment in China’s real estate and infrastructure sectors. But it may also be the latest manifestation of a trend that began a decade ago. And it may signal that China’s entire system of authoritarian state capitalism is less effective than many had believed.Recent data suggest that consumption is falling, indicating rocky times ahead:But China’s woes go far beyond the current busine
[Robert B. Reich] On democracy and dictatorship

Jan 16, 2019

The wonderful thing about Donald Trump’s presidency -- I never thought I’d begin a column this way -- is that he brings us back to basics.The basic difference between a democracy and a dictatorship comes down to means and ends.Democracy is about means, not ends. If we all agreed on the ends, such as whether to build a wall along the Mexican border, there’d be no need for democracy.But of course we don’t agree, which is why the means by which we resolve our differences are so important. Those mea
[Robert J. Fouser] Strong measures needed to fight fine dust

Jan 15, 2019

The past weekend saw another wave of fine dust blanket Korea. Over the past 10 years, the frequency of waves of fine dust has increased steadily, causing people to worry about negative effects on public health. The problem also causes changes in daily life. An elementary school teacher I met last fall told me that schools are eliminating playgrounds because there are so few days when the air is clean enough for children to use them. The South Korean government, meanwhile, has failed to come up w
[Kim Seong-kon] Future of overseas students of Korean studies

Jan 15, 2019

I have taught English literature, comparative literature and Korean literature at American universities, such as Penn State, UC Berkeley and BYU, for over six years. Whenever I have taught English or comparative literature, I have always tried to bridge the cultures of the East and West, through which I have enjoyed wonderful cultural interactions with my students. Whenever I have taught Korean literature at American universities, I have always been very impressed by my colleagues who are dedica
[Cass Sunstein] Trump’s emergency powers won’t get him a wall

Jan 15, 2019

Does President Donald Trump have the legal authority to declare a national emergency, and order the military to build a wall between Mexico and the United States?We are dealing with a novel question here, which means that any judgment has to have a degree of tentativeness. But the best answer appears to be no.Outside of the most extraordinary circumstances, the US Constitution does not give the president “emergency power.” If he wants to declare a national emergency -- to build a wall, to respon
[Peter Singer] Too much gratitude?

Jan 15, 2019

Last November, Michael Bloomberg made what may well be the largest private donation to higher education in modern times: $1.8 billion to enable his alma mater, Johns Hopkins University, to provide scholarships for eligible students unable to afford the school’s tuition. Bloomberg is grateful to Johns Hopkins, he explains, because the opportunity to study there, on a scholarship, “opened up doors that otherwise would have been closed, and allowed me to live the American dream.” In the year after
[Daniel Moss] Japan’s not back yet

Jan 15, 2019

Haruhiko Kuroda may rue the day he visited Nagoya.In a Nov. 5 speech to business leaders in the city, the Bank of Japan governor came close to declaring the end of deflation and the dawn of a new era. The implication was that interest rates may no longer be geared toward combating something that no longer exists. There was a whiff of normalization.Events have caught up with Kuroda and his upbeat comments look premature, at best, and like a misreading of the economic cycle. He’s likely to spend a
[Trudy Rubin] 2019’s real global security threats don’t include border crisis

Jan 14, 2019

As US President Donald Trump threatens to declare a state of emergency to counter a manufactured security crisis on the southern border, it’s worth looking at the real security challenges facing the country in 2019.List after published list of such security threats, as compiled by think tanks, the departments of State, Homeland Security and the US intelligence community, fail to mention the press of immigrants on the southern border as one of those dangers. That’s because it isn’t.Yes, border se
[Bharat Dogra] SDGs and grim global realities

Jan 14, 2019

In recent times the development discourse all over the world has been heavily influenced by the Sustainable Development Goals set by the United Nations in 2015 for the year 2030.These goals are in the form of specific targets for key areas of development, protection of the environment and so on.If these goals are achieved, then these 15 years will be the most successful years of human history in terms of reducing distress. Hunger is to be almost eliminated, while poverty will be reduced greatly.
[David Fickling] Xi’s leading China toward stagnation

Jan 14, 2019

The ambition of China hawks in the Trump administration is to maintain American dominance by halting China’s economic rise. It’s strange that President Xi Jinping appears to be working toward the same end.The risk for any economy approaching China’s level of development is that it gets ensnared in the middle-income trap. Once the low-hanging fruits of urbanization and industrialization have been plucked, countries tend to get stuck in second gear.Latin America, the former Soviet Union and the la