Postgraduate Course: Korean Politics and International Relations: History and Contemporary Issues (ASST11092)
Course Outline
| School | School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Not available to visiting students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | If East Asia has been increasingly become the focus of international politics today, Korea is certainly one of its most central topics and will be so for the foreseeable future. Nowhere is the history of imperialism and cold war politics more present than in the political division of the peninsula. Moreover, the erratic and sometimes mysterious behaviour or North Korea poses a grave security threat not only for the South, but also for Japan, China and the region in total, and - as the six party talks have demonstrated - is at the heart of a complex tangle of relations which reach far beyond East Asia. Finally, South Korea is one of the driving forces of the economic development in East Asia in recent times and in terms of growth will be one of the most dynamic economies in the region in the near future.
This course offers an overview of the political development of Korea since the mid-nineteenth century until the ca. 1990 within the network of East Asian relations. In a second part, it will focus on central issues of Korean domestic politics and international relations, such as the North-South divide and prospects of unification, North Korea's bid for nuclear power status and human rights violations in the country, border conflicts with Japan and the history dispute relating to the legacy of the Asia-Pacific War, Korea's economic role in East Asia and prospects of further regional integration with China and Japan. |
| Course description |
1. Introduction: Studying Korea, methods and aims
2. Korean history 1876 - 1945
3. The Korean War 1950-53
4. South Korea's domestic politics, 1945-1990
5. Managing the North - South divide: contemporary domestic politics and the possibilities of reunification
6. North Korea's regime: ideology, political structure and human rights violations
7. North Korea as security threat in East Asia
8. Korean-Japanese relations: history and borders
9. Korean-Chinese relations: in the shadow of a rising empire
10. The Korean diaspora in East Asia
11. South Korea's economy and role in East Asian economic integration
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2014/15, Not available to visiting students (SS1)
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Quota: 10 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 22,
Feedback/Feedforward Hours 2,
Formative Assessment Hours 2,
Summative Assessment Hours 2,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
168 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Student performance will be assessed by written assessment, 1 4,000 word essay (100%).
Formative feedback will be given on the basis of a mid-term paper (1,000 words) and a workshop with presentations of the papers as preparation for the 4,000 word essay.
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| Feedback |
Not entered |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
| The aim of this course therefore is to introduce students to the following subjects the history of Korea during the pre-war period, and of North and South Korea's domestic and foreign politics during the post-war period; the historical legacy of this history in the present; current issues of Korean domestic politics, both North and South; North Korea's role in East Asian security; South Korea's economic role and integration in East Asia.
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Reading List
Suh, J. J., Katzenstein, P. J., and Carlson, A., eds., 2004, Rethinking Security in East Asia : Identity, Power, and Efficiency. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press.
Peter Duus, The Abacus and the Sword: the Japanese Penetration of Korea, 1895-1910, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
Ramon Myers et al. The Japanese colonial empire, 1895-1945, Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, 1984.
Tsuyoshi Hasegawa (ed.), The Cold War in East Asia, 1945-1991, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011.
Wada, Haruki, The Korean War: an International History, Lanham, Maryland : Rowman & Littlefield, 2014.
Armstrong, Charles K., Tyranny of the weak : North Korea and the world, 1950-1992, Ithaca : Cornell University Press, 2013.
T. J. Pembel (ed.), The Economy-Security Nexus in Northeast Asia, New York: Routledge, 2012.
Kim, Samuel S., The two Koreas and the Great Powers, Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Charles K. Armstrong (ed.), Korean Society: Civil Society, Democracy and the State, 2nd ed., Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2006. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Special Arrangements |
Jointly taught with UG |
| Additional Class Delivery Information |
Jointly taught with UG |
| Keywords | KPaIR |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Prof Urs Matthias Zachmann
Tel: (0131 6)50 4225
Email: U.Zachmann@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Mr Iain Sutherland
Tel: (0131 6)51 3988
Email: Iain.Sutherland@ed.ac.uk |
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© Copyright 2014 The University of Edinburgh - 12 January 2015 3:29 am
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