The common images of Korea view the peninsula as a long-standing battleground for outside powers and the Cold War's last divided state. But, Korea's location at the very center of Northeast Asia gives it a pivotal role in the economic integration of the region and the dynamic development of its more powerful neighbors. A great wave of economic expansion, driven first by the Japanese miracle and then by the ascent of China, has made South Korea - an economic powerhouse in its own right - the hub of the region once again, a natural corridor for railroads and energy pipelines linking Asiatic Russia to China and Japan. And, over the horizon, an opening of North Korea, with multilateral support, would add another major push toward regional integration. Illuminating the role of the Korean peninsula in three modern historical periods, the eminent international contributors to this volume offer a fresh and stimulating appraisal of Korea as the key to the coalescence of a broad, open Northeast Asian regionalism in the twenty-fifth century.

Northeast Asia, where the interests of three major nuclear powers and the world's two largest economies converge around the unstable pivot of the Korean peninsula, is a region rife with political-economic paradox. It ranks today among the most dangerous areas on earth, plagued by security problems of global importance, including nuclear and missile proliferation. Yet, despite its insecurity, the region has continued to be the most rapidly growing on earth for over five decades—and it is emerging as an identifiable economic, political, and strategic region in its own right. As the locus of both economic growth and political-military uncertainty in Asia has moved further to the Northeast, a need has developed for a book that focuses analytically on prospects for Northeast Asian cooperation within the context of both Asia and the Asia-Pacific regional relationship. This book does exactly that, while also offering a more general theory for Asian institution building.

Presenting a succinct, historically informed introduction to North and South Korea, the second edition of The Koreas considers the radically different ways these countries have dealt with the growing challenges of globalization. Since the first edition’s publication, the economic, political, and social differences have only intensified, making evident the relevancy and importance of Armstrong’s work, in understanding the Koreas now and in the future. Ultimately, The Koreas is a crisp, engaging primer of Korea and the Korean people in the contemporary world. This book is ideal for many courses in a variety of disciplines, including politics, history, international business, and Asian studies.

North Korea, despite a shattered economy and a populace suffering from widespread hunger, has outlived repeated forecasts of its imminent demise. Charles K. Armstrong contends that a major source of North Korea's strength and resiliency, as well as of its flaws and shortcomings, lies in the poorly understood origins of its system of government. He examines the genesis of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) both as an important yet rarely studied example of a communist state and as part of modern Korean history.North Korea is one of the last redoubts of "unreformed" Marxism-Leninism in the world. Yet it is not a Soviet satellite in the East European manner, nor is its government the result of a local revolution, as in Cuba and Vietnam. Instead, the DPRK represents a unique "indigenization" of Soviet Stalinism, Armstrong finds. The system that formed under the umbrella of the Soviet occupation quickly developed into a nationalist regime as programs initiated from above merged with distinctive local conditions. Armstrong's account is based on long-classified documents captured by U.S. forces during the Korean War. This enormous archive of over 1.6 million pages provides unprecedented insight into the making of the Pyongyang regime and fuels the author's argument that the North Korean state is likely to remain viable for some years to come.

Developmentalist Cities addresses the missing urban story in research on East Asian developmentalism and the missing developmentalist story in studies of East Asian urbanization. It does so by promoting inter-disciplinary research into the subject of urban developmentalism: a term that editors Jamie Doucette and Bae-Gyoon Park use to highlight the particular nature of the urban as a site of and for developmentalist intervention. The contributors to this volume deepen this concept by examining the legacy of how Cold War and post-Cold War geopolitical economy, spaces of exception (from special zones to industrial districts), and diverse forms of expertise have helped produce urban space in East Asia. Contributors: Carolyn Cartier, Christina Kim Chilcote, Young Jin Choi, Jamie Doucette, Eli Friedman, Jim Glassman, Heidi Gottfried, Laam Hae, Jinn-yuh Hsu, Iam Chong Ip, Jin-Bum Jang, Soo-Hyun Kim, Jana M. Kleibert, Kah Wee Lee, Seung-Ook Lee, Christina Moon, Bae-Gyoon Park, Hyun Bang Shin.

To convey the image of a responsible power willing to contribute to regional stability and cooperation, China has shifted from a single-minded preference for bilateralism to an active participation in East Asian regionalism in the recent decades. This development has inspired discussions over whether a rising China could play a leadership role in building an institutionalized architecture for regional cooperation in East Asia. Nevertheless, this has not happened as East Asian regional cooperation and relevant activities remain mostly ad hoc and informal, especially when compared to regions such as Europe. To what extent has China contributed or constrained the development of regionalism in East Asia? What are China’s desired roles and objectives in East Asian regional cooperation? What is the level of trust that other regional players have for China in regional cooperation? This book seeks answers to these questions by exploring China’s motivations and strategic calculations as well as its policy practices in East Asian economic and security cooperation. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of Contemporary China.