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John Burton

John Burton is freelancer writer. He was Korea correspondent of the Financial Times, business editor of Korea JoongAng Daily, vice president of Insight Communication, Korea.

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John Burton

Democratic decay

By John BurtonFareed Zakaria's Global Public Square show on CNN is one of the few American television programs devoted to international issues. So it grabbed my attention when Zakaria, a respected foreign affairs analyst, took the time recently to comment on Korea's anti-feminist movement. Zakaria noted that ”there is a growing men's rights movement among young South Koreans, fanned in forums online and opportunistically courted by the country's right-wing politicians. The aggrieved men feel that policies to advance women in government and the workplace have left them behind,” despite Korea having the highest gender wage gap among advanced industrial countries and few female chief executives and corporate board members.He explained that Korea's traditional patriarchal society is being challenged by the rise of a generation of well-educated women who are entering the workforce and demanding greater representation in government and the private sector. But this is occurring against the backdrop of high youth unemployment, soaring housing prices and growing income inequality.

Feb 7, 2022By John Burton
John Burton

Stuck in a rut

By John BurtonAs he marks his first year in office, President Joe Biden's North Korea policy is failing for a number of reasons. His administration, after conducting a policy review on North Korea, had promised a “careful, calibrated approach” toward persuading Pyongyang ultimately to give up its nuclear program.However, nothing has happened. Washington and Pyongyang are not talking with each other despite the Biden administration's repeated statements that it sought “serious and sustained diplomacy” with North Korea and is willing to meet its representatives “anytime, anywhere, [and] without preconditions.” Indeed, there are signs of deterioration as North Korea hints that it could soon resume nuclear and long-range missile tests that it suspended in 2018 after former President Donald Trump began engaging with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.There are several reasons given for the stalemate. One is that North Korea has been distracted by its own draconian response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has seen it close the country to the outside world d

Jan 24, 2022By John Burton
John Burton

Kim Jong-un's decade in power

By John Burton“North Korea as we know it is over. Whether it comes apart in the next few weeks or over several months, the regime will not be able to hold together after the untimely death of its leader, Kim Jong-il.”That was the bold prediction of Victor Cha, a top North Korean expert in Washington, D.C., writing in the New York Times in December 2011. With Kim Jong-un now celebrating his 10th anniversary in power as dictator, Cha's comment is a reminder that forecasting what will happen in North Korea often amounts to a fool's errand.Predictions of North Korea's collapse have become routine over the last 30 years. When I was the Financial Times correspondent in Seoul in the 1990s, I remember being told by my editors to prepare to write about North Korea's downfall after the death of Kim Il-sung. Of course, his son, Kim Jong-il, would go on to rule for the next 17 years.Recurrent predictions about North Korea's collapse seem to amount to a sort of wish fulfillment among U.S. leaders. It was the views of Cha and others in the American foreign policy establishment that per

Dec 26, 2021By John Burton
John Burton

Korea's bumpy road to green energy

By John BurtonKorea faces a difficult challenge in meeting its ambitious targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which it promised in relation to this month's holding of the 26th U.N. Climate Change conference, COP 26.President Moon Jae-in announced that Korea, the world's seventh biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, would set a more stringent target by cutting its emissions by 40 percent from 2018 levels by 2030, and that the country would be carbon-neutral by 2050, a pledge that was enshrined in law in September. In addition, Korea was among 100 countries that said they would cut their methane emissions by 30 percent by 2030. It was also among 40 countries that pledged to end their use of coal for electricity generation by 2050 ― a big concession since the country is a major consumer of coal, the dirtiest of the fossil fuels. Environmental groups say that the targets will have to be raised even further if Korea is to meet its commitments under the 2015 Paris Climate Accord, which aims to limit global warming to within 1.5 degrees higher than pre-industrial average levels.Fossil

Nov 29, 2021By John Burton
John Burton

Time to ease sanctions

By John BurtonOne of the main criticisms of the U.N. sanctions against North Korea is that they hamper the delivery of humanitarian aid. The U.N.'s human rights expert on North Korea appeared to acknowledge this fact when he said recently that U.N. sanctions should be eased as the country faces a potential food crisis.The statement by Tomas Ojea Quintana, the U.N. special rapporteur, should provide an opportunity to re-examine whether U.N. sanctions are the most effective way to deal with ending North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile programs. He warned that with the most vulnerable children and elderly at risk of starvation due to Pyongyang's strict COVID-19 controls, the “sanctions imposed by the U.N. Security Council should be reviewed and eased when necessary to both facilitate humanitarian and lifesaving assistance."Other observers suggest that the easing of sanctions could help break the current deadlock between the U.S. and North Korea on the resumption of negotiations. The U.S., however, appears determined to keep the sanctions in place while paying lip service to

Nov 1, 2021By John Burton
John Burton

Inter-Korean arms race

By John BurtonThe past month has seen an escalating inter-Korean arms race with both Koreas testing their most advanced military systems. In mid-September, North Korea fired several solid-propellant ballistic missiles to test a new rail-based launch system that would make it more difficult to target and destroy them in a pre-emptive strike. This test followed the test of a new cruise missile. Pyongyang then capped off its activity last week by claiming that it had launched a “hypersonic” missile, the latest status symbol among leading military powers, including Russia and China. The next-generation Hwasong-8 missile can reportedly fly over Mach 5, five times faster than the speed of sound, and is meant to overwhelm current missile defense systems. While the Western media gave much attention to the North Korean missile tests as another example of Pyongyang's hostile intent, there was less overseas press coverage given to South Korea's test of a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM), matching North Korea's recent development of a similar weapon. The SLBM test coincide

Oct 4, 2021By John Burton
John Burton

North Korea's vaccine problem

By John BurtonNorth Korea surprised the world last week when it said that it was rejecting an offer by COVAX, the U.N.-supported global vaccine distribution program, to provide around 3 million doses of China's Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine.The decision by Pyongyang was puzzling since North Korea has been in severe lockdown for around 20 months, which has done immense damage to its economy. The supply of vaccines offered the hope that the country might be able to reopen its borders to humanitarian aid and ease the economic pressure when it is also suffering from international sanctions, natural disasters and worsening food shortages. So what is going on?One explanation is that the rejection bolsters North Korea's repeated claims in the face of global skepticism that it has suffered no COVID-19 cases, while justifying its “Juche” policy of self-reliance. It also provides an opportunity to score propaganda points against the U.S., which has been criticized for not doing enough in providing vaccines to poor countries. Pyongyang said it was declining the COVAX offer so that the va

Sep 6, 2021By John Burton
John Burton

Pragmatism over principle

By John BurtonIt is often the case of “damned if you do, damned if you don't” when it comes to the punishment of crooked corporate bosses in Korea. If officials send a convicted chief executive to jail, they are damned for hurting the economy. As a result, many company heads serve little or no prison time “for the good of the economy.” But if the government decides to free the executives, it is then damned for cozying up to the chaebol and creating the impression that they are above the law.This debate was once again revived when Lee Jae-yong, the de facto head of Samsung, was released on parole this month by the Justice Ministry after serving a total of 18 months in jail for bribing former President Park Geun-hye to approve a merger of Samsung units in 2015 that strengthened his family's control over the group. Critics said the move undermined President Moon Jae-in's promise to get tough with the chaebol and curb their power over the economy. But the release was probably inevitable. Samsung Electronics and its chip-making prowess is what is powering the econo

Aug 23, 2021By John Burton
John Burton

Joining the WFH bandwagon

By John BurtonHaving worked with several Korean companies over the years, I have come to the conclusion that their management practices are harming the country's development. The combination of a strict hierarchy based on seniority, autocratic bosses, long working hours (including mandatory after-work drinking sessions) and a top-down management style can be blamed partly for social ills such as the low female participation in the workforce, falling birthrate and high cost of living in Seoul. I was reminded of this when I read a story recently in The Economist about how traditional Korean work culture is even infecting the performance of digital startups despite their promises of flat hierarchies, flexible work and young, innovative workplaces. Korea's authoritarian management culture may have been justified during the country's rapid industrialization push in the 1960s and 1970s because it proved reasonably effective in marshalling large manpower resources to achieve ambitious economic goals. But it looks out of date in a new industrial age that puts a premium on innovation, entrepr

Jul 26, 2021By John Burton
John Burton

Climate change and two Koreas

By John BurtonPresident Moon Jae-in has signaled recently that he wants Korea to play a more prominent role on the global stage when it comes to climate change. He has already promised to cut the country's greenhouse gas emissions and is expected to announce later this year a more ambitious target to curb them in an effort to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. Seoul has also announced that it will no longer provide state-backed funds to build highly polluting coal-fired power plants overseas, a significant step since Korea is one of the largest foreign investors in this energy sector.But Moon and his successors will also need to turn their attention northward if they want to mitigate the local impact of climate change, because North Korea is an environmental disaster area. The upcoming summer months are likely to once again reveal the vulnerability of North Korea to extreme weather caused by climate change, which has resulted in floods and droughts in the past. If severe weather patterns occur this year, they will only exacerbate the challenges that North Korea is already facing due

Jul 12, 2021By John Burton
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