Democracy & Elections Executive Branch

Lawfare Daily: Turmoil in South Korea

Benjamin Wittes, Andrew Yeo, Jen Patja
Thursday, December 5, 2024, 8:00 AM
Discussing the martial law declaration, and reversal, by the South Korean president.

Published by The Lawfare Institute
in Cooperation With
Brookings

Lawfare Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes sits down with Andrew Yeo, Senior Fellow in the Foreign Policy Program and SK-Korea Foundation Chair of the Center for Asia Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, to talk about the current turmoil in South Korea. Within about 48 hours, there was a declaration of martial law, the National Assembly convened to rescind the declaration of martial law, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol accepted it, and now he faces impeachment. Yeo breaks down what’s going on and what it all might mean for the future of U.S.-South Korea relations in a second Trump administration.

You can watch a video version of their conversation here.

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Benjamin Wittes is editor in chief of Lawfare and a Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution. He is the author of several books.
Andrew Yeo  is a senior fellow and the SK-Korea Foundation Chair at the Brookings Institution’s Center for Asia Policy Studies. Yeo is also associate professor of politics at The Catholic University of America.
Jen Patja is the editor and producer of the Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security. She currently serves as the Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics, a nonprofit organization that empowers the next generation of leaders in Virginia by promoting constitutional literacy, critical thinking, and civic engagement. She is the former Deputy Director of the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier and has been a freelance editor for over 20 years.

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