On December 17 and 18, I would be hosting a group of scholars at the Research Information Services of the National Library of Korea (RINK) – where I am currently an Academic Book Publication Member – for a Core Working Group Workshop on a project led by Professor Haruko Satoh of the International Academic Forum (IAFOR) Research Centre of the Osaka School of International Public Policy (Japan and Korea in China-US Relations.

This project is funded by the Korea Foundation. The project diverts from the mere juxtaposition of Japan-Korea relations or China-US relations and situates the current policy issues at large in the bigger picture – the global context. After the preliminary workshop in Seoul, there will be a short teleconferencing of all participants from Seoul, Tokyo, Osaka and Singapore by video conferencing in the new year. We will be holding a full conference in Osaka in April 2020, which would result in a short policy report, and possibly a panel at the AAS in Asia in Osaka, in June 2020. The final outcome of the project would be in the form of a special issue in a peer-reviewed journal.

Professor Satoh and I first met in Florence, Italy in April 2018 when we were called in as members of the Democracy Cluster Meeting of the School of Transnational Governance, European University Institute. We continued our conversations on policy during her visit to Korea in December 2018, and later I was invited to the core working group which comprises of other knowledgeable senior colleagues. As a junior academic, it is an honor to be invited to work with several established senior academics on the topics that are vital to policymaking at this time. I am very much looking forward to working with them on this project.