Joel Atkinson

My new article on the South Korea's THAAD episode is now available (open access) onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

I wrote something on Trump’s abrupt scaling down of the Ulchi Freedom Shield joint military exercise with South Korea for the Prospect Foundation www.pf.org.tw/tw/pfch/13-1...

I wrote something on Trump’s abrupt scaling down of the Ulchi Freedom Shield joint military exercise with South Korea for the Prospect Foundation www.pf.org.tw/tw/pfch/13-1...

Just a reminder that we are hosting an event with the WSJ’s Jonathan Cheng tomorrow at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. So if you’re in Seoul and free tomorrow afternoon, please come along

Rather remarkable story of a German woman initiated into Korean shamanism www.koreatimes.co.kr/southkorea/g...

Wall Street Journal China bureau chief (and former Korea chief) Jonathan Cheng will be at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies to discuss North Korea, China and the region on Sept. 15. So if you’re in Seoul and the schedule works, please join us

Wall Street Journal China bureau chief (and former Korea chief) Jonathan Cheng will be at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies to discuss North Korea, China and the region on Sept. 15. So if you’re in Seoul and the schedule works, please join us

Some free downloads are available of my new article on the role of Chinese nuclear strike in decision making around the Korea THAAD episode www.tandfonline.com/eprint/PAWTC...

'Outsourcing anti-dependency: Brazil’s fraught embedded-autonomy approach to China' 🌟 New Review of International Studies article and video abstract OUT NOW 🚨 By Rute Ester Brasileiro da Silva co-authored with Joel Atkinson 🎉 Read and watch here! 👉 https://ow.ly/vovQ50XB999

"...many in Taiwan quite reasonably expect the Lee Administration will cooperate substantively with China at Taiwan’s expense. But the reality is... here in Seoul, the secular trend is for relations to continue to worsen even with these periodic cycles of warming."

Wrote something on the recent US-China-South Korea summitry and implications for Taiwan for Taiwan's Prospect Foundation www.pf.org.tw/tw/pfch/13-1...

I have a new article out with co-author Rute Ester Brasileiro da Silva on Brazil-China relations in Review of International Studies. It’s open access so free to read. You can access it here: doi.org/10.1017/S026...

“North Korea is actively enhancing its nuclear and missile capabilities. It’s opening new enrichment facilities, new rocket engines... nuclear-capable destroyers,” I explained in a recent @globalnews.ca interview with @jeffsemple.bsky.social that appears in their vivid report on Operation NEON.

I have a new article out with co-author Rute Ester Brasileiro da Silva on Brazil-China relations in Review of International Studies. It’s open access so free to read. You can access it here: doi.org/10.1017/S026...

#OpenAccess from @risjnl.bsky.social - Outsourcing anti-dependency: Brazil’s fraught embedded-autonomy approach to China - https://cup.org/4o18uEW - @joelatkinson.bsky.social & Rute Ester Brasileiro da Silva #FirstView

Call for submissions for The Journal of East Asian Affairs @joeaa.bsky.social 38/2 (Spring 2026). Submissions are on rolling basis, but guaranteed consideration for next issue, if received by January 1 www.inss.re.kr/en/aboutus/P...

The new issue of the Journal of East Asian Affairs @JOEAA_INSS is out, the English-language journal of South Korea’s Institute for National Security Strategy (INSS). (I am executive editor, with Mason Richey as editor-in-chief) www.inss.re.kr/en/publicati...

Most newsworthy thing coming out of APEC and it's not even close

Feeling confident? Think again — you’re probably wrong. www.japantimes.co.jp/commentary/2...

If you want to know how Koreans are reacting to the immigration raid at the battery plant in Georgia, a recent poll has 59.2% responding “I am greatly disappointed in the Trump administration” and 30.7% responding “I understand the Trump administration’s measures” www.realmeter.net/%eb%a6%ac%ec...

I'm stunned by this. In 2019 SEALs killed 2-3 North Korean civilians diving for shellfish and now it's in the NYT www.nytimes.com/2025/09/05/u...

In June 1983, Xi Zhongxun, the father of Xi Jinping, hosted Kim Jong-il, the father of Kim Jong-un, in Beijing. They watched a performance by Peng Liyuan, who years later would marry Xi Jinping.

Kim Jong Un's daughter, Ju-ae, has apparently accompanied him on the visit to Beijing

N. Korea publicly announces leader's plan to attend China's Sept. military parade | Yonhap News Agency en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN2025...

Asking if students have done the readings

Ah, the customary and highly symbolic presidential exchange of MAGA hats www.koreatimes.co.kr/photos/photo...

Very colorful Lee and Trump Q&A www.chosun.com/english/nati...

This is pretty dark stuff from Lankov: "achieving success in nuclear development will be difficult. But if it does not succeed, I doubt whether the Republic of Korea will have a long-term future" m.news.nate.com/view/2025082...

Lim Eul-chul, Kyungnam University: "North Korea is seeking to push the Lee Jae Myung administration into making a more drastic shift...by exerting maximum pressure...The key question is whether...[Lee-Trump summit] will show...greater diplomatic autonomy vis-a-vis the US”

Important piece on the abuse of migrant fishers in Taiwan by @michaelturton.bsky.social, who argues that the government has the power to do something about it—if they wanted to.

My new Pacific Review article explains why China’s economic & diplomatic coercion of South Korea over the USFK THAAD deployment had little—if anything—to do with protecting its nuclear deterrent www.tandfonline.com/eprint/PAWTC...

The details/quotes in this story are pure gold www.koreatimes.co.kr/lifestyle/pe...

If you'd like to learn more about President Lee's policies towards China and Russia, you can check out @joelatkinson.bsky.social's and my appearance on KBS World from yesterday (episode from 07.08, at minute 8). world.kbs.co.kr/service/prog...

If you want to know why Chinese leader Xi Jinping (probably) talks about “great changes unseen in a century” with Putin and elsewhere—and you definitely should want to know why—I’ve got you covered thediplomat.com/2025/07/the-...

I explain why Xi Jinping’s signature “Great Changes Unseen in a Century” is likely derivative of a popular Chinese nationalist self-help book, Liu Mingfu’s “China Dream” (2010), which is riffing on a 1994 quote from Kissinger thediplomat.com/2025/07/the-...