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Since 1995 when North Korea called for help from abroad in order to alleviate food supply gaps, European NGOs have been operating in North Korea, despite the fact that the creed of these NGOs are obviously at odds with the Kim Jong Il dictatorship. This article attempts to explore reasons for the cooperative relations between European NGOs and the Kim Jong Il dictatorship, through focusing on capacity building by European NGOs in and for North Korea. According to our findings, a successful experience of the European NGOs is based on a ‘help for self-help’ approach as well as a long-term opportunity costs approach which involves time-consuming and risky rural development with and for local people on the spot. It is also a process of mutual learning for the NGOs and North Koreans, through which the ‘global justice’ of Sen experiences a new sustainable dimension.

The dividing line between the two Koreas, whether the 38th parallel or military demarcation line, has been with us since 1945. The original division of Korea, considered a temporary military expediency to denote where Soviet and American forces should accept the surrender of Japanese troops, was portentous; the line never disappeared 67 years later, even after reshaped by battle after the Korean War. This paper contends that the 1945 division of Korea reflected by the United States little aforethought about Korea’s strategic position and low regard for the Korean people’s ability to self-govern as an independent nation. America’s designation of occupation zones in Korea was poorly handled, with enormous consequences for the Korean people. It arguably was part of a legacy of mismanaging a series of “big decisions” affecting Korea that continue to this day. The lesson of history for the U.S. is to be better informed and prepared to fulfill its responsibility toward the Korean peninsula; as a signatory to the Armistice it must be a participant in a permanent peace agreement. The creation of a governmental U.S. institute for Korean unification affairs as a counterpart to the organizations that exist in South Korea and North Korea is recommended preparatory step.

This article examines the evolution of scholarly debates about the lives and careers of two recent US Presidents (Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford) and their National Security Advisor and Secretary of State (Henry A. Kissinger). Discussing the very latest research, it demonstrates that the medium of political biography continues to be of crucial importance for all scholars of political history. This is the case even for those of an avowedly ‘structuralist’ bent. The article shows that many of the debates about the use and abuse of power in the United States between 1969 and 1977 have a continued contemporary relevance. The article examines the thinking of the central protagonists with regard to the place of the United States in the world. Especial attention is paid to the thought and writing of Henry Kissinger, a onetime Harvard professor and prodigious author and commentator since leaving office in 1977. It is also argued that foreign policy cannot be conducted in a diplomatic vacuum and that domestic politics will always be in the ascendancy in policymaking terms. In short, it argues for a structural worldview that privileges the notion of a Primat der Innenpolitik.

What is the relationship between the institutional choice and the success of economic reform in post-communist countries? To test the effects of institutions on political and economic transformations, I present pooled time-series cross-section data in 25 post-communist countries for 1994-2003. I find that post-communist countries with PR are associated with a high level of economic reform, and parliamentary systems are related to better democratic governments. Yet, other political variables, chief executives’ partisanship and check and balance do not have a statistically significant relationship either with democracy or economic reform.

This paper argues that North Korea needs an outside “Two-track engagement” to enhance Human Rights for its people because the regime has a systemic limit. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) takes advantage of repression and violence as an instrument to secure the regime’s stability. Major North Korea’s Human Rights issues which are reflected in the UN Human Rights Resolutions are related to the Neoliberals’ way of exhortation over the matters of reunion of separated family members, abduction, food control, freedom of speech, arbitrary detention, and human trafficking etc. In North Korea, domestic societal opposition is too weak and/or too oppressed to present a significant challenge to the wayward regime. Human Rights issues can be addressed by the international community in three phases. First, establish an atmosphere through a process of adaptation and strategic bargaining, establishing a transnational Human Rights network in order to enhance North Korean Human Rights. Second, promote cooperation through a process of moral consciousness-raising, “shaming,” argumentation, dialogue, and persuasion thereby offering Human Rights education and training in order to revise ‘Our Style’’ Human Rights of North Korea. Third, develop full-scale cooperation through a process of institutionalization and habitualization, providing incentives for institutionalization of international norms for Human Rights by spreading shared values for Human Rights and mobilizing all-out support for Human Rights from member states of the international community. Political and economic incentives to North Korea can be offered if the regime tries to solve major Human Rights issues including public executions, repatriation of POWs, and elimination of torture and inhuman treatment without due process of law in correctional centers.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the fertility policies of Germany. The fertility policies are related to social structural problems, such as low birthrate, aging population, increased number of women joining the workforce, unstable labor market and family structure, and limit of welfare fund, and they are becoming new social agendas in the process of securing women's labor force to maintain sustainable economic growth and welfare system and achieving various gender equality goals. Therefore, the policies to increase birthrate and enable women to balance work and family life are important tasks for the German society to secure democracy and legitimacy as well as to solve women's problems. This study examines the German solutions for sustainable democracy by focusing on its fertility policies, the way the German government implements family policies and policies to enable women to balance work and family life from a perspective on sustainable family policy for sustainable growth and welfare. This study also examines the changes in the direction and characteristics of gender policies and the paradigm of fertility policies as a result of the government's active intervention.

This study was conducted to examine directions of medical security in the process of Korean unification. It is assumed that Korea will be unified peacefully, achieving successful economic reform of North Korea. North Korea has pursued 'universalization of medical security' through a national monopoly of means of production. Medical security of North Korea is characterized as the free medical treatment system, the system of district assigned to an individual doctor, and valuing preventive medicine, and cooperative medical service between Oriental medical service and Western medical service. On the other hand, in South Korea the compulsory health insurance program was implemented for the entire population. The Medical Assistance Law was also enacted to provide medical service to those without the means to pay. It is epoch-marking that North Korea introduced capitalist principles of medical insurance in the Sinuiju Special Administration District. North and South Korean medical security should be integrated in the direction in which the two systems are convergent on the better criteria which reflect merits of both systems. Conservative unionism is set up in this study as an ideological model of unified Korean medical security. It is suggested in this study that basic strategies for integration of South and North Korean medical security include supporting North Korean reform and open-door policy, promoting of medical exchange and cooperation, intensifying state's responsibility for medical care, and harmonizing values of North and South Korean medical security.

The number of non-ethnic Koreans living long term in South Korea reached 1.5 million in 2012 leading to preemptive multicultural legislation. This has challenged widely held beliefs in racial and ethnic homogeneity regarded as the mainspring of South Korea’s national security and defense against a belligerent North Korean state which shares similar beliefs in ethnic homogeneity. North Korea has been politically and ideologically ‘othered’ as a ‘foreign’ Korean state and therefore a threat. The representation of the foreign is intrinsic to South Korean identity and multicultural initiatives are generating competing narratives on the site and nature on national identity. This paper considers the strategic implications of multiculturalism for the nature and direction of inter-Korean relations.

To discuss the resumption of the stalled six party talks, simple comparative analysis of the positions of related nations alone is inadequate. What is needed is an analysis of the multi party negotiation structure and a third party intervention model needed for solving the problems between the related parties. At issue is the problem of deciding whether to consider an outside mediator to solve this impasse or to choose one of the related countries as a 3mediator. Also, should either China or South Korea be expected to take on this mediator role, one of the strategic consideration is deciding on what this role is going to be. Theoretically, the role of a mediator can be diverse and includes that of issue communicator, conflict mitigator or proposal arbitrator for solving cultural problems. It is questionable as to whether South Korea or China can be expected to fulfill this role of mediator during the six party talks. Lastly, questions remain as to whether mediation needs to be neutral or prejudiced or partial in order for it to be successful, In theory, the neutrality or objectivity is considered as an important factor for success in mediation. It remains, however, to be seen whether such factors laid out in theory can be applicable to the six party talks for solving the North Korean nuclear issue.