Organizer: Young-Whan Kihl, Iowa State University

Discussants: Hong N. Kim, West Virginia University; Chae-Jin Lee, Claremont McKenna College

Given the topical nature of North Korea’s nuclear controversy, with anticipated progress in the on-going six-party talks in Beijing aiming at the diplomatic settlement of the nuclear standoff between the United States and the DPRK, the proposed Roundtable on North Korea will make an eminent and timely sense.

The proposed roundtable panel will not limit itself to the nuclear issues, however, but will also encompass the broader subjects of the North Korean regime maintenance and survival strategy. It will, for instance, address the on-going economic reform efforts in the North, Inter- Korean Relations, North Korea’s relations with each of the Major Powers, including China, Russia, Japan, the U.S. and the European Union countries.

This proposal on "North Korea: Regime Maintenance and Survival Strategy" is submitted on behalf of each of the following three subgroups of the AAS membership:

a)   The contributing authors of the edited volume, NORTH KOREA: Politics of Regime Survival (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2005), with a total of nine experts on North (See the attached book flyer)

b)   The fellows and friends of the Research Council on Korean Reunification (RCKR). This group has met regularly as part of the AAS annual convention among the members, sponsoring the "Rountable on Korea’s Future and Reunification" on a regular basis listed in the annual program.