Stanford students now can choose Korea track as a major. Dafna Zur, assistant professor of East Asian languages and cultures, says "the major we've created responds to the interest we've sensed on campus and gives students the opportunity to explore Korea in a truly interdisciplinary way."

The full article is available here.

Alluding to the famous dictum by China’s late leader, Deng Xiaoping, Min Weifang, the executive president of Chinese Society for Education Development Strategies and professor at Peking University (PKU), China, noted that the “water has become very deep, it is difficult to touch the stones [to cross the river].” Min’s comments came at the end of a conference titled “Building World-Class Universities: An Institutional Perspective,” and they specifically referred to the challenges facing Chinese institutions of higher learning. Yet, the phrase nicely captured the challenges facing institutions of higher education worldwide in remolding institutions, social norms and structures to better adapt to the 21^st century. Institutions of higher learning – whether “world-class” or not – need to grasp the demands of a rapidly changing future that is hard to discern. Speakers highlighted the complexities of globalization, market pressures, and a contracting public purse which encumber university governance and produce conflicting goals.

The conference, which was hosted at the Stanford Center at Peking University from Nov. 4-5, was part of the Beijing Forum 2016 and brought together over 30 scholars, university presidents and other thought leaders from 11 countries in Europe, Russia, North America and the Asia-Pacific region. The Forum aimed to focus on the institutional contexts that promote the construction and longevity of world-class universities. The second half of the Forum featured debates about the criteria for and, even, the very definition of “world-class.”

The Forum generated cross-cutting themes among a wide range of experts in attendance. The most prominent themes that emerged included the role of the government; government-university relations; and the tensions between education and knowledge production in universities. The Forum first highlighted the various “world-class university-projects” and elite national university-projects around the globe including in China, Russia, South Korea, Japan and Pakistan. Forum discussions then shifted to focus on questions such as “what is a university?” and “what is world-class”? Various university ranking systems drew skepticism, yet were also recognized as a resource used by donors, governments, alumni and prospective students.

As a policy prescription, a heavy role of the government in university education drew the most fire especially from Chinese colleagues who emphasized China’s need for greater university autonomy from government interference. All could agree, however, upon the important role of the government in tertiary education and, in particular, for building world-class universities, even if striking the proper balance between the role of the government and university administration necessarily differed depending on the national context.

Panelists agreed that contemporary challenges facing top-tier universities are many. They include social and economic pressures that favor “multiversities” over smaller, more cohesive universities; tensions among conflicting stakeholders in “multiversities”; intensification of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) research; commercialization of knowledge; diminishing focus on undergraduate education; overproduction of doctoral degrees; inequality in access to and quality of higher education; and increasing administrative scale and complexity of university management. Many panelists throughout the conference appeared to concur that accelerated knowledge production, a more direct connection to national development goals, increased specialization and commercialization have produced significant benefits in recent years. But they also acknowledged that these benefits have come with a price – perhaps in the form of excellence in undergraduate teaching.

The gains that Peking University and Tsinghua University, in particular, and Chinese universities, in general, have made were widely acknowledged. Increasing numbers of Asian universities, too, have entered the top-tier in global rankings. Yet, solving 21st century demands – as opposed to just managing them – still appeared difficult as experts and thought leaders grappled with what, if any, institutional models can best meet those demands. Some experts suggested providing students access to different kinds of tertiary education (for example, in the form of community colleges, vocational colleges, liberal arts and research universities, as in the U.S. context). Most experts, if not all, agreed that universities need to shore up their educational missions and ensure balanced support for both the humanities and social sciences as well as the sciences and technical fields. In addition, many experts emphasized the need to address societal imbalances and provide better access to quality higher education to all socioeconomic classes.

Related links:

Forum agenda and list of panelists

Photo gallery

Japanese and American scholars and practitioners gathered at Stanford recently for “Womenomics, the Workplace, and Women,” a full-day conference seeking to find pathways to advance opportunity for women in society and the workplace.

Nearly 75 people attended the public conference, which included 20 speakers and was co-sponsored by Stanford’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center and the Clayman Institute for Gender Research, as well as the United States-Japan Foundation and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

Takeo Hoshi, director of the Japan Program at Shorenstein APARC, noted that women in Japan and the United States have long encountered obstacles related to gender. Currently, the United States and Japan rank 45^th and 111^th, respectively, on the Global Gender Gap Index.

“The conference is a unique opportunity for experts from Japan and Silicon Valley to learn from each other and their countries’ recent attempts to tackle gender diversity, particularly in the areas of business and technology,” Hoshi said.

The Japanese government’s inclusion of women’s advancement in its economic growth strategy 'Abenomics,' named after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, is “one of the few good policies,” Hoshi said, yet complex cultural constraints and workplace policies need to change in order for it to work. Similarly, in Silicon Valley, while strides have been made, gender diversity still lags in corporate leadership and boards of directors especially in the areas of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics).

Panelists shared perspectives on women’s status, leadership and work-life balance in both countries throughout four panel discussions led by Hoshi, and Shelley Correll, director of the Clayman Institute and professor of sociology; Kenji Kushida, Japan Program research scholar; and Mariko Yoshihara Yang, a visiting scholar at Shorenstein APARC.

One broad theme that emerged in the discussions: gender equity progress takes time. Closing the gender gap will come incrementally and a multidisciplinary approach could help the process. 

Areas highlighted by the panelists included a need to address unconscious bias and to improve programs that support women in the workplace as well as those seeking to re-enter the labor force after taking time off, such as increased access to childcare and elimination of “evening work” for those who hold full-time jobs.

Panelists suggested expanding educational opportunities, mentorship and peer-to-peer networks among women, as well as training centered on gender equity for all employees. Quotas and government incentives for organizations that adopt equity practices were also proposed to achieve greater female representation.

Additional discussions took place between the panelists in a closed-door workshop the following day. A report that details outcomes and a set of policy recommendations is expected in 2017; the full list of panelists, topics addressed and conference agenda can be viewed here.

Researchers in the Korea Program regularly contribute to Korean media on the Korean affairs ranging from education and economics to politics and North Korea nuclear issues. The articles are in Korean language.

Nationalist Populism in South Korea (Gi-Wook Shin, August 18, 2019)

The Ambiguous Boundary Between Korean Wave and the Anti-Korean Sentiment (Joyce Lee, May 2, 2019)

Restoring the Dignity of South Korea (Gi-Wook Shin, April 18, 2019)

Happiness and Productivity (Yong Suk Lee, March 21, 2019)

Softness Overcomes Hardness  (Joyce Lee, March 6, 2019)

What should the Hanoi Declaration lay out? (Gi-Wook Shin, February 20, 2019)

What Would an Aged Society Look Like? (Yong Suk Lee, January 23, 2019)

Confront the lure of populism or risk economic failures and the coming of a far-right extremist regime (Gi-Wook Shin, January 17, 2019)

Only a drastic measure towards denuclearization can resolve the current stalemate with North Korea (Gi-Wook Shin, interview with Korea Times, January 10, 2019)

Looking After Myself (Joyce Lee, January 9, 2019)

2018, The Moon Jae-In Government's Progress Report (Gi-Wook Shin, December 27, 2018)

Rethinking North Korean Economy? (Yong Suk Lee, November 29, 2018)

The Dark Side of the Korean Culture of Hierarchy (Joyce Lee, November 14, 2018)

Trump's Second Half (Gi-Wook Shin, November 7, 2018)

How Parents Can Help their Children with Career Planning (Yong Suk Lee, October 17, 2018)

Anticipation and Concerns Mount Ahead of the 3rd Inter-Korean Summit (Joyce Lee, September 19, 2018)

Spring on the Korean Peninsula Needs to be hard fought (Gi-Wook Shin, September 5, 2018)

Should we encourage kids to learn coding? (Yong Suk Lee, August 6, 2018)

Some Thoughts on the Korean Value of Saving Face (Joyce Lee, July 16, 2018)

Koreans abroad can play important roles in achieving peace on the Korean Peninsula (Gi-Wook Shin, July 2, 2018)

Withdrawal of US troops from South Korea now becomes an option (Gi-Wook Shin, June 20, 2018)

Trump in Face-Saving Action for Kim (Joyce Lee, June 18, 2018)

South Korea and the U.S. Differ on Priorities for North Korea Policy (Gi-Wook Shin, May 14, 2018)

Is CVID Possible? (Gi-Wook Shin, May 7, 2018)

CVID Faces Challenges (Gi-Wook Shin, May 3, 2018)

The April 27 Korea Summit and the Lingering Question of CVID+α (Gi-Wook Shin, April 30, 2018)

Choices for Your Happiness (Joyce Lee, April 23, 2018)

The Ambiguity of the Moon Government's Goal for the Inter-Korean Summit (Gi-Wook Shin, April 2, 2018)

Korea as a Pacemaker (Gi-Wook Shin, March 13, 2018)

MeToo Movement Should Create Lasting Social Change (Gi-Wook Shin, March 12, 2018)

What's Wrong with Being a Nobody? (Joyce Lee, February 26, 2018)

It's Time to Move Beyond the Political Deadlock of Comfort Women Issue (Gi-Wook Shin, January 15, 2018)

Can the Government Rouse Young Koreans from Their Dreams of Childless Comfort? (Joyce Lee, January 3, 2018)

A Grand Bargain between the US and China Seems More Likely than Ever (Yong Suk Lee, December 25, 2017)

Korea No Longer a Country of Koreans (Rennie Moon, December 11, 2017)

Moon Administration's Diplomatic and Securtiy Strategies (Gi-Wook Shin, November 27, 2017)

Making Little Mr. and Ms. Perfects, But for Whose Sake and at What Cost? (Joyce Lee, November 6, 2017)

Identifying Korea as a Developed Country (Joon Nak Choi, October 30, 2017)

Superficial Korea (Gi-Wook Shin, September 26, 2017)

What Comes After the War of Words Between Trump and Kim Jong-un (Gi-Wook Shin, September 25, 2017)

In the Midst of Rising Fears of War (Joyce Lee, September 12, 2017)

Broken English as the global language (Rennie Moon, August 28, 2017)

'Polifessors' of Moon administration (Gi-Wook Shin, July 24, 2017)

In Anticipation of the Era of Korean Studies (Joyce Lee, July 17, 2017)

Technological Change: Why Korea needs a longer-term perspective on job creation (Yong Suk Lee, June 27, 2017)

Global network of Koreans abroad (Gi-Wook Shin, June 6, 2017)

First summit meeting, not to hurry (Gi-Wook Shin, May 22, 2017)

Korean Americans' love for Korea (Rennie Moon, April 24, 2017)

Trump's anti-immigration stance to be an opportunity for Korea (Gi-Wook Shin, February 27, 2017)

A Labor market by the young, and for the young (Yong Suk Lee, January 30, 2017)

If Korean universities are to succeed with internationalization (Rennie Moon, November 21, 2016)

US presidential election and Korea (Gi-Wook Shin, October 24, 2016)

Political expediency should not block technology innovation (Joon Nak Choi, September 12, 2016)

Strategic policy on inter-Korean relations is essential (Gi-Wook Shin, August 1, 2016)

Is Korea ready to embrace risk and failure? (Yong Suk Lee, June 20, 2016)

Can Pankyo become Silicon Valley in Korea? (Gi-Wook Shin, May 9, 2016)

Rennie J. Moon has been selected as the 2016-17 Koret Fellow in the Korea Program at Stanford’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC). She will join the center next January to study diversity in higher education and teach a student course.

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Moon is an associate professor at the Underwood International College at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. Her research explores the interrelationships among globalization, migration and citizenship, and internationalization of higher education.

Moon, a graduate of Stanford’s Graduate School of Education, Ph.D. ‘09, has collaborated with Stanford professor Gi-Wook Shin on a multiyear research project that examines diversity in higher education in East Asia. She co-edited the book Internationalizing Higher Education in Korea: Challenges and Opportunities in Comparative Perspective published earlier this year.

Stanford professor Francisco O. Ramirez, an expert on international comparative education and sociology of education, recognized her scholarly contributions to the field.

“Moon is a creative contributor to the ‘world society perspective’ in the social sciences,” said Ramirez, noting that Moon's work has been published in leading journals of international comparative education, Comparative Education Review and Comparative Education.

Supported by the Koret Foundation, the Koret Fellowship brings professionals to Stanford to conduct research on contemporary Korean affairs. In 2015, the fellowship expanded its focus to include social, cultural and educational issues in North and South Korea, and aims to identify emerging scholars working on those areas.

During her fellowship, Moon will also give public talks and be a lead organizer of the Koret Workshop, an international conference held annually at Stanford.

“As an alum, I’m very pleased and excited to spend my sabbatical year at Stanford,” Moon said. “Over the last few years, I’ve been collaborating on various research projects with Professor Shin and other colleagues at APARC. I’m looking forward to a productive fellowship during which I hope to bring these evolving projects to fruition.”

Moon holds a doctorate and master’s degree in international comparative education from Stanford and a bachelor’s degree in French from Wellesley College.

Japan and South Korea face serious demographic crises. Japan has the oldest population in the world and South Korea is one of the most rapidly aging. Together they top the list in terms of proportion of elderly by 2050, with 40.1% and 35.9% respectively being 65 and over, according to a U.S. Census Bureau forecast. Both nations are seeing shrinking working-age populations, with their birthrates among the lowest in the world. This puts them at great risk as they struggle to find new engines of economic growth.

Some experts argue that Japan and South Korea should encourage immigration. The former head of Tokyo's Immigration Bureau, Hidenori Sakanaka, said that "we need an immigration revolution to bring in 10 million people in the next 50 years, otherwise the Japanese economy will collapse." Jongryn Mo, a professor at Yonsei University in Seoul has written a book, "Strong Immigration Nation," urging a similar policy for South Korea.

Japan and South Korea are already supplementing their shrinking workforce with foreign labor, mostly unskilled migrant workers from China and Southeast Asia doing jobs that locals shun.

But it is time to attract more skilled workers. In Japan, only 18.4% of foreign workers were technicians or professionals in 2015, while the figure in Korea is just 7.8% this year. Skilled foreign workers can fill many jobs from staffing hospitals to working as technicians in middle-tier companies and software engineers in large ones.

The challenge, however, is that both countries remain exclusionary, closed societies despite a substantial rise in the numbers of foreigners. Politicians fear losing votes from workers worried about foreigners taking their jobs.

According to a recent report by the French business school INSEAD, Japan and South Korea are ranked 53rd and 61st, respectively in their level of tolerance for immigrants. Most foreign skilled workers have little intention to settle down in Japan or South Korea on a permanent basis, although unskilled ones might be more willing to stay.

Maria, a Guatemalan professional, decided to leave South Korea after working for six years in the overseas marketing department of a large Korean corporation. "Some Koreans complain that foreigners leave after a few years, but we leave because we're never included in the first place. Korean companies pay a lot to bring foreigners here. And then they don't even ask these people about their opinion."

Srey, a Cambodian student studying in Japan, said, "The Japanese are very helpful and very friendly, but at the same time they look at me as a 'gaijin' no matter how good I am at Japanese or able to speak to them. I am not planning to work in Japan."

Bridging strategy

South Korea and Japan need to find a more creative strategy in utilizing foreign talent. In particular, they should pay close attention to their transnational networks rather than pushing for permanent migration. Not only should both countries focus on the knowledge and skills of foreign labor talent, but also the social networks they can possess.

This calls for a particular type of social capital: transnational bridging. A person who has social ties in more than one place can serve as a bridge between those different places. Such bridging can be performed within a city or a country or across borders, but the latter is becoming more important with globalization. By bridging distant networks, people can connect disparate cultures, build trust and facilitate cross-national cooperation that are essential in business transactions. Many Indian and Chinese entrepreneurs and engineers working in Silicon Valley are active in transnational bridging with their home country.

Transnational bridging can be a good new strategy for South Korea and Japan in attracting foreign skilled labor since they can offer valuable experiences and networks as advanced economies, if not permanent places to live. They can help foreign talent to build social ties while studying and working and encourage them to serve as a bridge between South Korea and Japan and their next destination once they leave in what could be called "brain linkage."

They can still contribute to South Korea or Japan even after they depart. Maria said she was willing to do business involving both South Korea and her home country. Srey is also eager to do business with Japan after graduating, even though he will not work in the country.

South Korea and Japan should adopt a policy of "Study-Work-Bridge" rather than the "Study-Work-Migration" pathway commonly encouraged by settler societies. This new policy framework would establish programs providing systematic networking opportunities for skilled foreigners while in Japan or South Korea. It would upgrade the quality of campus life for foreign students and work environments for foreign professionals so they leave with positive experiences.

Most importantly, it would provide institutional support to help maintain transnational networks between foreigners and South Koreans and Japanese.

In Japan, a Study-Work framework has already begun to take shape. Among foreign students seeking employment in Japan in 2013, approximately 24% found jobs. According to the country's ministry of justice, 10,696 of 11,698 foreign students are successful in applying for a change of visa status after graduating from college. This is very encouraging. Still, foreign students feel that Japanese companies are reluctant to embrace their full potential and largely expect them to assimilate, often leading them to stay in Japan only for a short time.

In South Korea, with a shorter history of foreign student intake, a Study-Work framework has yet to emerge. While 64.3% of South Korean companies say they need and want to hire foreign students, only a very small portion of foreign students work in South Korean companies after graduation, perhaps as low as 1%. South Korea's immigration laws for foreign students have eased slightly in recent years, but there is an urgent need to develop solid, institutionalized support for responding to the substantial demand by foreign students who wish to find employment after their studies.

Challenges ahead

Both countries are moving in the right direction, but until they are ready to embrace a more comprehensive migration policy down the road, they should develop the "bridging" component of a Study-Work-Bridge framework as an interim strategy. That means considering how foreign skilled labor can contribute to their economies even if they stay only temporarily.

This non-migration-bridging concept can be also appealing to foreign workers who like to move on after gaining valuable experiences and networks. By activating the social networks they have left behind, foreigners can later become powerful "transnational bridges." With economic globalization, such linkages will be all the more important.

Research shows that science and engineering majors may have more to contribute as human capital, but business and social science majors are more inclined to play a bridging role. Universities and corporations should establish diversity offices, as seen in the U.S. and elsewhere, to promote a culture of tolerance and non-discrimination.

The challenges associated with aging, depopulation and a shrinking workforce are expected to intensify in the coming years. Yet foreign talent is readily at hand for both countries. They need to look no further than the skilled foreigners who already have connections with South Korea or Japan either through schooling or employment and to continue to cultivate such connections through a Study-Work-Bridge approach.

Gi-Wook Shin is director of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University and co-author of Global Talent: Skilled Labor as Social Capital in Korea. Rennie J. Moon is an associate professor at the Underwood International College at Yonsei University in Seoul.

This article was originally carried by Nikkei Asian Review on Aug. 31 and reposted with permission.