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COLUMN Good housing needs back-to-basics approach

There is renewed and intense focus on increasing the housing supply in Seoul. Officials in the Lee Jae Myung administration describe its housing policy as "dakgong," which in Korean both literal and figuratively means "shut up and supply." In early August, the government announced that it has plan to supply some 230,000 units, about 100,000 of which will come from designated public housing districts in the greater Seoul area. Just how the administration will do that has prompted questions about what makes for good housing. Seoul, the capital city replete with jobs, a strong public transportation system and other infrastructure, is crowed. Finding the right housing, rental or owned, that both fits within your budget and satisfies your needs is a tall order. On the house hunt for more than three decades, this writer was fortunate to have lived in a "guchuk," or apartment built in old style, block concrete with outdoor corridors. The structure of the apartment allowed for natural ventilation when windows on the veranda and the back corridor were simultaneously opened. Trees planted decades

3 MIN READBy Kim Ji-soo

OPINION Trump's Korea gamble: Putting politics ahead of vital alliance

U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest moves on the Korean Peninsula should alarm Seoul — not because Washington is considering renewed dialogue with Pyongyang, but because the president appears increasingly willing to subordinate a longstanding alliance to short-term political calculations. On the eve of the annual South Korea-U.S. military exercise, Trump ordered the Pentagon to “substantially” scale back the drills, citing their cost and allegedly provocative nature. More revealingly, he invoked his “very good relationship” with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. He also complained that President Lee Jae Myung had declined his request for South Korean support for U.S.' military campaign against Iran. A day later, Trump said Kim had responded to his latest outreach for dialogue. The timing is difficult to dismiss as coincidence. Trump appears to be reviving the playbook of his first term: reduce military pressure on North Korea, emphasize his personal rapport with Kim and seek a dramatic leader-to-leader bargain. But the circumstances have changed profoundly. North Korea is mo

4 MIN READBy Shim Jae-yun

Hallyu meets heritage

The world's biggest pop group could have chosen virtually any backdrop for its latest teaser. Instead, BTS stood beneath the graceful eaves of Seonhyewon, a centuries-old hanok, a traditional wooden courtyard house, in Seoul, where polished floors, paper doors and quiet open space carried as much visual weight as the seven members themselves. It was a setting built not for spectacle but for reflection — an unlikely stage for one of the world's most recognizable entertainment acts. Built for reflection, contemplation and the slow rhythm of daily life, these traditional structures are increasingly serving as stages for global pop culture — broadcasting carefully crafted performances to millions around the world. That evolution hints at the next chapter of hallyu, the Korean wave that has propelled Korea's popular culture onto the global stage. For more than two decades, Korea's cultural success was measured largely by export metrics — streaming figures, overseas box-office receipts and positions on global music charts. Traditional culture often appeared as visual decoration, featured

3 MIN READBy Samuel Len

A century of loving silence

Manhae Han Yong-un (1879-1944) was a remarkable man. He was a Buddhist monk, a thinker, a radical reformer of Korean Buddhism, a poet, a novelist and a major figure in the struggle for Korean independence. He cared passionately about younger generations growing up in a rapidly changing land, deprived of its true identity. He was born on Aug. 29, 1879. On Aug. 29, 1910, Korea was officially annexed by Japan. On Aug. 29, 1926, Manhae published the collection of poems for which he is best remembered, "Nimui Chinmuk." His birth name was Han Yu-cheon. In 1905, when he became a Buddhist monk, his meditation master gave him the name Yong-un (Dragon Cloud). Manhae (Ten thousand seas) was his pen-name. "Nimui Chinmuk" was published just 100 ago this year. Celebrations have been organized, but we might wonder how many Koreans today spend much time reading its 88 poems, written in a language which is far removed from the Korean spoken or written today. But those who grew up reading it in Korean language textbooks in school never quite forget the resonance the poem of same title evoked. On the cen

4 MIN READBy Brother Anthony

Guest Columns

  • Open letter to new US envoy Michelle Steel

    The new U.S. ambassador to South Korea is a diplomat who represents the president and government of the United States and advances American national interests. It would therefore be inappropriate to expect the newly arrived Ambassador Michelle Steel to advocate South Korea’s position simply because she is Korean American. Major policy questions involving shipbuilding, nuclear energy and security require deliberation and coordination among the White House, the State Department, the Defense Department, the Energy Department and Congress. At the same time, an ambassador should not be viewed merely as a messenger. An ambassador serves as a vital diplomatic channel who accurately explains the host country’s strategic value and public sentiment to Washington, identifies common ground when the two countries’ interests diverge and helps translate agreements between their leaders into concrete policies. A former politician with extensive experience and personal networks in both Congress and the Donald Trump administration can be particularly effective in facilitating policy change. In thi

    5 MIN READBy Moon Keun-sik

  • Nuclear faultlines and South Korea's choices

    The Korean Peninsula is a particularly risk-prone region in the Asia-Pacific. Locked in a dispute with its southern neighbor since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, North Korea eventually armed itself with nuclear weapons. Hostility on the peninsula has lingered over the past decades. Meanwhile, the Asia-Pacific region is steadily accumulating nuclear risks through the spread of nuclear capabilities, the hardening of strategic rivalries and the rising possibility of miscalculations. In other words, what may appear manageable in isolation becomes uncontrollable collectively. The Asia-Pacific region may not be akin to the Europe of 1914 that collapsed under the weight of rigid alliance structures, accelerating arms competition and misplaced confidence that systemic complexity could provide stability. Nevertheless, the possibility that institutional fragility and the advent of emerging and disruptive technologies could combine to create an increasingly dangerous security environment merits serious consideration. The central question is whether the region's governments and strategic commu

    4 MIN READBy Salma Malik

Tribune Service

  • How the media can earn back America's trust

    The freedom of the press is one of America’s greatest protections against unchecked power. But freedom carries responsibility, and journalism cannot demand the public’s trust simply because the Constitution protects our right to publish. We must earn it. That responsibility has become more urgent as confidence in journalism has collapsed. Gallup reported last year that only 28 percent of Americans had a great deal or fair amount of confidence that newspapers, television and radio report the news fully, accurately and fairly, the lowest level since Gallup began asking the question in 1972. Those numbers should trouble every journalist, editor, publisher and media owner in America. The Fourth Estate was never intended to become an extension of the Republican Party, the Democratic Party, corporate America or any ideological movement. Our obligation is not to protect politicians we admire or destroy those we dislike. It is not to tell readers what they should think. Our responsibility is to pursue the truth and give citizens the information necessary to think for themselves. That means que

    2 MIN READ

  • Is lettuce safe? Probably. Will cyclospora spur change? Hopefully

    4 MIN READBy Lisa Jarvis

  • Illinois spent big during COVID and the migrant crisis. Who was watching the bills?

    Remember all the way back in 2023, during the height of the migrant influx, when Tribune reporting uncovered that a city contractor running operations at migrant shelters was submitting some eye-popping bills? During one week in March of that year, the majority of Favorite Staffing workers at city migrant shelters logged 84-hour workweeks, according to examined invoices. That meant their staff was working 12-hour days, seven days a week. Extraordinarily, logs for one worker reported they worked five 12-hour shifts, a 14-hour shift and a 16-hour shift one week that March. Favorite Staffing billed the city $15,525 for that worker alone. For one week! We had no evidence of fraud. What we did have was a hard time understanding how such a hefty percentage of their workers were logging those kinds of highly unusual hours. Back then, we called for an audit to make sure everything was on the up and up. Now, the state of Illinois finds itself in a tricky situation of its own with Favorite Staffing. A report from Illinois Auditor General Christopher Meister released Tuesday revealed that the state

    3 MIN READ

Columnists

  • Michael Breen

    Michael Breen is the CEO of Insight Communications Consultants, a public relations company, and author of "The Koreans" and "Kim Jong-il: North Korea's Dear Leader."

  • Chun In-bum

    Chun In-bum is the former commander of the Republic of Korea Army Special Warfare Command.

  • Eugene Lee

    Eugene Lee is a lecturing professor at the Graduate School of Governance at Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul.

  • Mark Peterson

    Mark Peterson is associate professor of Korean, Asian and Near Eastern languages at Brigham Young University in Utah.

  • Troy Stangarone

    Troy Stangarone is the senior director of congressional affairs and trade at the Korea Economic Institute.

  • Kim Sung-woo

    Kim Sung-woo is the head of Environment & Energy Research Institute at Kim & Chang.

Read more

Bernard Rowan

The value of Confucianism

Thinking of my first visit to Seoul, I remember a particular interaction. My friend, his eldest son and I left their apartment building. We took the elevator down and arrived on the first floor. As we exited, an older woman, who appeared to be a household worker, was entering the elevator. My friend made the special effort to have his son bow to her and to greet her with the phrase, “Good morning, ajumeoni.” The bowing took some assistance, but not much. His son was quite young, and I think this was his first time seeing the ajumma. It struck me as very polite but natural or customary, and I inquired as to who she was. This was one of my first lessons about ajumma in Korea. This was a simple example of building familial bonds of mutual respect by a professor and his son for a woman unrelated to them and not employed by them, but someone, if not from the street, then a stranger, but in a role familiar to the parent. The ajumma was not a peer or from a high-born family by all appearances. My friend wanted his son to learn the behaviors of respect, avoidance of scapegoating and regard

11h agoBy Bernard Rowan
The value of Confucianism
Tribune Service

How the media can earn back America's trust

The freedom of the press is one of America’s greatest protections against unchecked power. But freedom carries responsibility, and journalism cannot demand the public’s trust simply because the Constitution protects our right to publish. We must earn it. That responsibility has become more urgent as confidence in journalism has collapsed. Gallup reported last year that only 28 percent of Americans had a great deal or fair amount of confidence that newspapers, television and radio report the news fully, accurately and fairly, the lowest level since Gallup began asking the question in 1972. Those numbers should trouble every journalist, editor, publisher and media owner in America. The Fourth Estate was never intended to become an extension of the Republican Party, the Democratic Party, corporate America or any ideological movement. Our obligation is not to protect politicians we admire or destroy those we dislike. It is not to tell readers what they should think. Our responsibility is to pursue the truth and give citizens the information necessary to think for themselves. That means que

14h ago
Guest Columns

Open letter to new US envoy Michelle Steel

The new U.S. ambassador to South Korea is a diplomat who represents the president and government of the United States and advances American national interests. It would therefore be inappropriate to expect the newly arrived Ambassador Michelle Steel to advocate South Korea’s position simply because she is Korean American. Major policy questions involving shipbuilding, nuclear energy and security require deliberation and coordination among the White House, the State Department, the Defense Department, the Energy Department and Congress. At the same time, an ambassador should not be viewed merely as a messenger. An ambassador serves as a vital diplomatic channel who accurately explains the host country’s strategic value and public sentiment to Washington, identifies common ground when the two countries’ interests diverge and helps translate agreements between their leaders into concrete policies. A former politician with extensive experience and personal networks in both Congress and the Donald Trump administration can be particularly effective in facilitating policy change. In thi

16h agoBy Moon Keun-sik
Open letter to new US envoy Michelle Steel
Desk Columns

COLUMN Good housing needs back-to-basics approach

There is renewed and intense focus on increasing the housing supply in Seoul. Officials in the Lee Jae Myung administration describe its housing policy as "dakgong," which in Korean both literal and figuratively means "shut up and supply." In early August, the government announced that it has plan to supply some 230,000 units, about 100,000 of which will come from designated public housing districts in the greater Seoul area. Just how the administration will do that has prompted questions about what makes for good housing. Seoul, the capital city replete with jobs, a strong public transportation system and other infrastructure, is crowed. Finding the right housing, rental or owned, that both fits within your budget and satisfies your needs is a tall order. On the house hunt for more than three decades, this writer was fortunate to have lived in a "guchuk," or apartment built in old style, block concrete with outdoor corridors. The structure of the apartment allowed for natural ventilation when windows on the veranda and the back corridor were simultaneously opened. Trees planted decades

2d agoBy Kim Ji-soo
[COLUMN] Good housing needs back-to-basics approach
Michael Breen

NK peace

Are we on the cusp of change in Korea? It is a question that makes us reach for our helmets in this part of the world. For decades, the pattern has been remarkably consistent: crises, talks and tensions, all managed so superbly under the American umbrella that North Korea has been held in check and South Korea has become a major industrial power. Two developments this week suggest that the tectonic plates under the peninsula might shift. The first came on Saturday, when President Lee Jae Myung used his Liberation Day speech to call for talks with North Korea aimed at formally ending the Korean War and replacing the 1953 armistice with a permanent peace agreement. The second is coming from Washington. Reports say President Donald Trump is pushing his aides to arrange a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un as early as this autumn. Trump has already ordered a substantial reduction in US-South Korean military exercises, saying he wants to revive his relationship with Kim. We should not over-analyze, but it is worth being on alert for how Kim might respond to both initiatives — and how

Aug 20, 2026By Michael Breen
NK peace
Tribune Service

Is lettuce safe? Probably. Will cyclospora spur change? Hopefully

For the last month, Americans have viewed their lunchtime salads or even a single, crisp leaf of iceberg on their burger as a possible threat. Could it harbor cyclospora, the explosive-diarrhea-causing parasite that by early August had sickened thousands, hospitalized hundreds, and led to two deaths? In Michigan, the epicenter of the cyclospora outbreak, cases are on the downturn, yet our national fear persists. It didn’t help that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently widened the scope of the outbreak to 15 states (a move that is more about retrospective detective work than some new surge in infections). Nor is it comforting that the root cause of the outbreak — that is, how the suspected tainted lettuce was contaminated — is still a mystery. Adding to the chaos is a separate recall of products containing potentially salmonella-tainted jalapeños distributed by Taylor Farms, the same company implicated in the cyclospora outbreak. Americans are rightly overwhelmed and confused. When can they feel safe throwing a bag of lettuce in their grocery carts again? Probab

Aug 20, 2026By Lisa Jarvis
Is lettuce safe? Probably. Will cyclospora spur change? Hopefully
Guest Columns

Nuclear faultlines and South Korea's choices

The Korean Peninsula is a particularly risk-prone region in the Asia-Pacific. Locked in a dispute with its southern neighbor since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, North Korea eventually armed itself with nuclear weapons. Hostility on the peninsula has lingered over the past decades. Meanwhile, the Asia-Pacific region is steadily accumulating nuclear risks through the spread of nuclear capabilities, the hardening of strategic rivalries and the rising possibility of miscalculations. In other words, what may appear manageable in isolation becomes uncontrollable collectively. The Asia-Pacific region may not be akin to the Europe of 1914 that collapsed under the weight of rigid alliance structures, accelerating arms competition and misplaced confidence that systemic complexity could provide stability. Nevertheless, the possibility that institutional fragility and the advent of emerging and disruptive technologies could combine to create an increasingly dangerous security environment merits serious consideration. The central question is whether the region's governments and strategic commu

Aug 20, 2026By Salma Malik
Nuclear faultlines and South Korea's choices
Tribune Service

Illinois spent big during COVID and the migrant crisis. Who was watching the bills?

Remember all the way back in 2023, during the height of the migrant influx, when Tribune reporting uncovered that a city contractor running operations at migrant shelters was submitting some eye-popping bills? During one week in March of that year, the majority of Favorite Staffing workers at city migrant shelters logged 84-hour workweeks, according to examined invoices. That meant their staff was working 12-hour days, seven days a week. Extraordinarily, logs for one worker reported they worked five 12-hour shifts, a 14-hour shift and a 16-hour shift one week that March. Favorite Staffing billed the city $15,525 for that worker alone. For one week! We had no evidence of fraud. What we did have was a hard time understanding how such a hefty percentage of their workers were logging those kinds of highly unusual hours. Back then, we called for an audit to make sure everything was on the up and up. Now, the state of Illinois finds itself in a tricky situation of its own with Favorite Staffing. A report from Illinois Auditor General Christopher Meister released Tuesday revealed that the state

Aug 20, 2026
Desk Columns

OPINION Trump's Korea gamble: Putting politics ahead of vital alliance

U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest moves on the Korean Peninsula should alarm Seoul — not because Washington is considering renewed dialogue with Pyongyang, but because the president appears increasingly willing to subordinate a longstanding alliance to short-term political calculations. On the eve of the annual South Korea-U.S. military exercise, Trump ordered the Pentagon to “substantially” scale back the drills, citing their cost and allegedly provocative nature. More revealingly, he invoked his “very good relationship” with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. He also complained that President Lee Jae Myung had declined his request for South Korean support for U.S.' military campaign against Iran. A day later, Trump said Kim had responded to his latest outreach for dialogue. The timing is difficult to dismiss as coincidence. Trump appears to be reviving the playbook of his first term: reduce military pressure on North Korea, emphasize his personal rapport with Kim and seek a dramatic leader-to-leader bargain. But the circumstances have changed profoundly. North Korea is mo

Aug 19, 2026By Shim Jae-yun
[OPINION] Trump's Korea gamble: Putting politics ahead of vital alliance
Guest Columns

No one should be too old for AI

Every morning, an 85-year-old American woman greets her artificial intelligence (AI) companion, ElliQ. It reminds her to take her medication, encourages her to stay active and helps her remain independent. For her, AI is no longer a futuristic concept — it is a trusted daily companion. Her story is no longer the stuff of science fiction. AI is everywhere today, helping older people live healthier, safer and more connected lives. By supporting independent living, easing the burden on caregivers and improving access to health care, AI is demonstrating enormous potential to improve the lives of millions while making health and care systems more sustainable. In my work to advance the rights of older people, I have been greatly encouraged by the remarkable progress AI continues to bring to their lives. But does this mean AI always serves the best interests of older people? Not necessarily. As AI increasingly shapes access to health care, long-term care, public services, financial support and other essential aspects of daily life, it also affects their ability to enjoy their fundamental hu

Aug 19, 2026By Suh Chung-ha
No one should be too old for AI
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