Branding K-REDD+ and its implications for South Korea's middle power diplomacy

ABSTRACT

The need for new and stronger middle power diplomacy is growing as global challenges are increasingly governed by various horizontal inter- and trans-national networks. Climate change is one of the most complex and urgent global challenges that require collective action, and it is an issue for which more middle power leadership is greatly needed. The Republic of Korea (ROK) has been successful in becoming a primary actor in green growth governance, and its success has been attributed to its strategic middlepowermanship, integrating both material and ideational contents. Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) in tropical developing countries has been lauded as an immediate and effective solution to mitigate climate change. ROK's unique history of forest transition before rapid economic growth highlights the fact that improving forest management is possible even with imperfect governance, rapid population growth, and low economic development. The lessons learned from ROK's forest transition can be developed as a distinct contribution to the international effort to address forest-related impacts on climate change, and offer an important opportunity for ROK to play a constructive role and achieve enhanced stature within the international community.     

Ausbruch aus dem Gehäuse der Economic Governance. Überlegungen zu einer Soziologie der Wirtschaftsdemokratie in transformativer Absicht

The New Economic Governance (NEG) in the European Union is a core element of a neoliberal crisis constitutionalism that has to be seen as blatantly deficient when measured with democratic yardsticks. Strongly normative criticism generates important findings, but ignores the economic dimension of damage to democracy. From the perspective of capitalism theory, the NEG can be recognised as a product of a capitalistic land grab (“Landnahme”) of the political field and as a system of institutions whose functional logic corresponds to the imperative of a crisis-ridden economy characterised by the financial markets. In this context, viewpoints are confirmed that regard the integration of the economic causes of blatant deficits of democracy as an essential element of a new type of inclusive democracy project. The work on a new economic democracy as a core element of such a democracy project thus also becomes a desideratum for a public sociology that wishes to contribute evidence-based knowledge to social disputes.     

Agilität als Chance für einen neuen Anlauf zum demokratischen Unternehmen?

There has been a long-standing discussion since the 1980s about the question whether new production models harbor a potential for extended employee participation and involvement, in most cases with disillusioning results. This paper is concerned with so called “agile methods”, which play an important part in the area of knowledge work in the course of the digital transformation. On the basis of two case studies from software development and industrial R&D, the paper examines the concrete implementation of these methods and the employees’ perspective upon them and their consequences. The result is that agile methods present a potential for extended employee participation and involvement; however, the realization of this potential depends on the concrete way how the agile concept of “empowerment” is implemented.     

Nicht-Nachhaltigkeit auf der Suche nach einer politischen Form. Konturen der demokratischen Postwachstumsgesellschaft

The article examines the triangular relation between ecological sustainability, economic growth and liberal democracy and asserts that this relation is dramatically altered in the face of the increasingly imminent manifestation of the “limits to growth.” In the course of this process, the contours of a “democratic post-growth regime” are beginning to show – though in a very different way than was hoped for by the majority of transformation researchers. Intent on making a contribution to re-relating those normative factions of sustainability research which share a transformative self-understanding to the scientific analysis of modern societies, the paper shows how central eco-political and democracy-related narratives that have dominated the debate for decades have lost credibility, thus opening up the space for a readjustment of the named triangular relation. Applying a social theory perspective, it is subsequently shown how, in the face of modern conceptions of subjectivity and, at best, moderate growth rates, democracy is increasingly turning into an instrument for the unflinching sustainment of unsustainable lifestyles. As it turns out, modern consumer societies persist in their “politics of non-sustainability” more uncompromisingly than ever before.     

Obama’s Pivot to Asia and Its Failed Japan-South Korea Historical Reconciliation

Since the 1980s, Japan’s war memory has strained its relations with South Korea and China, to a less degree, the USA. Two of the thorniest issues are the comfort women and the US atomic bombing of Japan. Before the Obama administration announced its policy pivot to Asia in 2011, both Japanese and American leaders were reluctant to make amends for the past acts of their countries. However, in 2015, the Japanese conservative Prime Minister Abe reached an agreement with South Korea that “finally and irreversibly” resolved the comfort women issue, thus achieving a historic reconciliation between the two countries. In 2016, then President Obama visited Hiroshima to commemorate the atomic bomb victims. Then, in December 2016, the comfort women issue resurfaced in Japan and South Korea relations, indicating a failure of the reconciliation. Why did the USA change its policy on historical issues involving Japan? Why did Abe and the South Korean President Park Geun-hye settle the comfort women issue? Why did Obama visit Hiroshima? Why did the reconciliation fail? In this article, I propose a rational choice theory to answer these questions. Applying the proposed theory and relying on available evidence, I argue that the settlement of the comfort women issue and Obama’s visit to Hiroshima are important components of Obama’s pivot to Asia to balance China’s rise. The reconciliation failed mainly because it did not resolve the historical justice issue promoted by the human rights norms. I discuss some implications for reconciliation in Northeast Asia.     

Study on the standard components of digital forensics laboratory

Recently, digital forensics has become increasingly important as it is used by investigation agencies, corporate, and private sector. To supplement the limitations of evidence capacity and be recognized in court, it is essential to establish an environment that ensures the integrity of the entire process ranging from collecting and analyzing to submitting digital evidence to court. In this study, common elements were extracted by comparing and analyzing ISO/IEC 17025, 27001 standards and Interpol and Council of Europe (CoE) guidelines to derive the necessary components for building a digital forensic laboratory. Subsequently, based on 21 digital forensic experts in the field, Delphi survey and verifications were conducted in three rounds. As a result, 40 components from seven areas were derived. The research results are based on the establishment, operation, management, and authentication of a digital forensics laboratory suitable for the domestic environment, with added credibility through collection of the opinions of 21 experts in the field of digital forensics in Korea. This study can be referred to in establishing digital forensic laboratories in national, public, and private digital forensic organizations as well as for employing as competency measurement criteria in courts to evaluate the reliability of the analysis results.