This column originally appeared on October 5, 2022, in the South China Morning Post. CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – To lose one’s sense of decency by raising the threat of nuclear weapons just once – here we’re talking directly to you, Mr. Vladimir Putin – may be dismissed as…
Category: Articles
JAPAN: HOOP DREAMS COME ALIVE AT THE SAITAMA SUPER ARENA
TRISTIN CLINT WRITES – The NBA Japan Games 2022 concluded this past weekend with the Golden State Warriors winning both exhibition games over the Washington Wizards. This two-game set, which began September 30th, marked not only the sixteenth NBA game that Japan has hosted, but the first to be played…
PHILIPPINES: LIKE FATHER, NOT LIKE SON
MOHAMMED ALKANDARI WRITES – Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. needed only a few months, after his swearing in as the 17th president of the Philippines, to prove that he would be a better leader than his dictatorial father. As the son of a tyrant synonymous with violence and corruption, Marcos Jr.…
MOVIE REVIEW: NOT HOLLYWOOD, NOT BOLLYWOOD, BUT TOLLYWOOD’S “RRR” IS MAKING INTERNATIONAL HEADLINES
BENJAMIN BARRETT WRITES – If you haven’t already seen it, you have probably heard of it. RRR is one of the most globally successful movies today. Released in theaters across the world in March 2022, it has only in the past few months become popular in the United States. Directed…
CHINA: ONE PODCAST TAKES A DIFFERENT APPROACH
RYAN BYRNE WRITES – In recent years, the rhetoric between China and the United States has grown more intense. A trade war, endless diplomatic wrangling over the South China Sea and conflicts with Taiwan have helped make China a point of political interest for more and more Americans. As the…
BOOK REVIEW: COUNTERFEIT (2022) BY KIRSTEN CHEN – HOUSEWIFE TURNS CRIMINAL MASTERMIND
BOOK REVIEW EDITOR-IN-CHIEF ELLA KELLEHER WRITES – Kirsten Chen’s latest novel, Counterfeit (2022), follows Ava Wong – a straight-edge Chinese-American lawyer shackled to an agonizingly mundane routine of house chores and taking care of her maddening infant, Henri, who cannot seem to cease his daily tantrums. Married to a successful yet always…
CHINESE INVESTMENT IN US FARMLAND: HARVEST OF SHAME?
ISMAEL HAMMOUNAÏCHA WRITES – It’s hardly any secret that Chinese corporations and overseas partners have been allocating capital in international investments around the globe. In line with China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a central component of Xi Jinping’s “Major Country Diplomacy,” these investments are aimed at China’s undertaking of…
RUSSIA: THE LESSON MIKHAIL GORBACHEV’S LEGACY HOLDS FOR VLADIMIR PUTIN AND XI JINPING
This column originally appeared on September 7, 2022, in the South China Morning Post. CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – Last week, the last president of the Soviet Union at 91 had to leave us (his wife Raisa had departed in 1999), so it must be said now that a true…
RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR: EVEN AS ‘TV RAIN’ RETURNS, RUSSIAN MEDIA SITUATION REMAINS GRIM
RYAN BYRNE WRITES – As Russian and Ukrainian soldiers fight one another for control of Ukraine, another battle rages on both inside and outside of Russia: The battle for control of information. In July, the banned television station TV Rain (Dozhd) returned to the airwaves-this time from outside of Russia’s…
NORTH KOREA: FIVE YEAR PLAN IN A 40 YEAR WORLD… ARE NO PLANS AT ALL. HOW TO MAKE A 40 YEAR PLAN
This piece originally appeared on September 2, 2022, in The Korea Daily. SPENCER H. KIM WRITES – President Yoon Suk-yeol has presented an “audacious” plan in which South Korea will “significantly improve North Korea’s economy and its people’s livelihoods in stages if the North ceases the development of its nuclear…
CHINA-ROK RELATIONS: CHINA AND THE ROK SHOULD AVOID SACRIFICING THEIR LONG-TERM, COMMON INTERESTS FOR SHORT-TERM, PAROCHIAL ONES
This article originally appeared on August 30, 2022 in China Daily. CHUNG-IN MOON WRITES – The Republic of Korea and China are celebrating the 30th anniversary of their diplomatic relations this year. The relations between the two countries have witnessed a sea change over the past three decades. People-to-people exchanges…
BOOK REVIEW: PEOPLE FROM MY NEIGHBORHOOD (2020) BY HIROMI KAWAKAMI – DO YOU REALLY KNOW YOUR NEIGHBORS?
BOOK REVIEW EDITOR-IN-CHIEF ELLA KELLEHER WRITES – Hiromi Kawakami’s collection of vignettes titled People From My Neighborhood (2020), recently published into English, details the individuals of her neighborhood in a brilliant piece of bite-sized fiction. In 120 pages, the reader is plunged into a lifetime of drama, secrets, and otherworldly quirkiness…
US-KOREAN RELATIONS: US MEDIA MUST LAY GROUNDWORK FOR PEACE OFFENSIVE ON KOREAN PENINSULA
This column originally appeared in on August 23, 2022 in the South China Morning Post. CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – A media system can filter your world-view not unlike the narrowest religion claiming to know what’s best about everything. Truly professional media platforms, especially if print-based, will aim to…
BOOK REVIEW: THE PLOTTERS (2018) BY KIM UN-SU – WHO PULLS THE TRIGGER FOR POLITICANS?
BOOK REVIEW EDITOR-IN-CHIEF ELLA KELLEHER WRITES – Government corruption. Political scandals. Contract killers. Disappearances. Set in contemporary Seoul, South Korea, the world within Kim Un-Su’s novel, The Plotters (2018), focuses on the deaths of random political figures as well as who is pulling the trigger. The shadowy figures responsible for…
AFGHAN WOMEN: POWER STRUGGLES WITH THE TALIBAN
ARYANA KHALILZADEH WRITES – One year ago, the world watched images of desperate Afghans clinging to taxiing military planes in hopes of fleeing the Taliban regime at Kabul Airport, or seeing hundreds of desperate Afghan citizens pushing the fences on the tarmac to be flown out of the country. That…
SPORTS: ASIA’S WORLD CUP POTENTIAL
BENJAMIN BARRETT WRITES – The FIFA 2022 World Cup hosted by Qatar begins in late November and history is already being made. This year, Asia is boasting a record six teams that have qualified for the tournament: Australia, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, South Korea, and Qatar. Only second to Europe,…