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Keun Lee

Keun Lee

Writing for PS since 2021
13 commentaries

Keun Lee, a former vice chair of the National Economic Advisory Council for the President of South Korea and a former president of the International Schumpeter Society, is Professor of Economics at Seoul National University, winner of the 2014 Schumpeter Prize, and the author of China’s Technological Leapfrogging and Economic Catch-up: A Schumpeterian Perspective (Oxford University Press, 2022).

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  1. The Key to Greening Heavy Industry
    klee15_ INA FASSBENDERAFP via Getty Images_green hydrogen INA FASSBENDERAFP via Getty Images

    The Key to Greening Heavy Industry

    Aug 21, 2023 Keun Lee & John Mathews tout breakthroughs in green-hydrogen production that promise to accelerate the net-zero transition.

  2. Keun Lee on AI, Chinese growth, innovation systems, and more
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    Keun Lee on AI, Chinese growth, innovation systems, and more

    Aug 15, 2023 Keun Lee considers what artificial intelligence requires of governments, identifies lessons for advanced economies pursuing industrial policy, highlights the risk inequality poses to China’s development, and more.

  3. The Myth of AI-Driven Unemployment
    klee13_Chen SanhuVCG via Getty Images_ai factory Chen Sanhu/VCG via Getty Images

    The Myth of AI-Driven Unemployment

    Jun 22, 2023 Keun Lee says that eschewing artificial intelligence would do far more harm to workers than embracing it.

  4. The Sources of East Asia’s Industrial Prowess
    klee12_Christopher FurlongGetty Images_hyundiaelectric Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

    The Sources of East Asia’s Industrial Prowess

    Apr 25, 2023 Keun Lee considers how South Korean firms attained global dominance in critical sectors like semiconductors.

  5. Will the New Industrial Policy Work?
    klee11_MANAN VATSYAYANAAFP via Getty Images_vinfastvietnamelectricvehicle Manan Vatsyayana/AFP via Getty Images

    Will the New Industrial Policy Work?

    Feb 24, 2023 Keun Lee highlights common mistakes that governments must avoid when promoting critical sectors.

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  1. khrushcheva171_MIKHAIL METZELPOOLAFP via Getty Images_putinkim Mikhail Metzel/Pool/AFP via Getty Images

    Putin and Kim’s Cartoon Summit

    Nina L. Khrushcheva thinks that Russia's recent meeting with North Korea was intended primarily as a warning to the South.
  2. haykel18_MANDEL NGANAFP via Getty Images_mbs Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images

    Saudi Arabia’s New Nationalism

    Bernard Haykel explains the reasoning behind the Kingdom's ongoing domestic- and foreign-policy transformation.
  3. wagner22_Lukas SchulzeGetty Images_pollution Lukas Schulze/Getty Images

    The Green Growth Mindset

    Gernot Wagner sees doctrinaire debates about capitalism as irrelevant or even deleterious to the decarbonization effort.
  4. mallochbrown17_GIANLUIGI GUERCIAAFP via Getty Images_africawomenpolitics Gianluigi Guercia/AFP via Getty Images

    Africa Is the Future of Multilateralism

    Mark Malloch-Brown explains why the continent should be at the forefront of efforts to bring about international reforms.
  5. op_yi2_PEDRO PARDOAFP via Getty Images_chinahousing Pedro Pardo/AFP via Getty Images

    A Chinese Bubble Long in the Making

    Yi Fuxian

    The Chinese government is very good at covering up small problems, but these often pile up into much bigger ones that can no longer be ignored. The current real-estate bubble is a case in point, casting serious doubts not just on the wisdom of past policies but also on China's long-term economic future.

    traces the long roots of the country's mounting economic and financial problems.
  6. bp industrial policy Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images

    Industrial Policy Is Back

    From semiconductors to electric vehicles, governments are identifying the strategic industries of the future and intervening to support them – abandoning decades of neoliberal orthodoxy in the process. Are industrial policies the key to tackling twenty-first-century economic challenges or a recipe for market distortions and lower efficiency?

  7. fischer208_DrAfter123Getty Images_AIhuman DrAfter123/Getty Images

    Is AI a Master or Slave?

    Joschka Fischer wonders whether humanity can even hope to maintain control in an era of “mega-crisis.”
  8. haldar25_BettmannGetty Images_friedmanreagan Bettmann/Getty Images

    Laying Chicago Economics to Rest

    Antara Haldar

    From breakthroughs in behavioral economics to mounting evidence in the real world, there is good reason to think that the economic orthodoxy of the past 50 years now has one foot in the grave. The question is whether the mainstream economics profession has gotten the memo.

    looks back on 50 years of neoclassical economic orthodoxy and the damage it has wrought.
  9. delong254_ Samuel CorumGetty Images_january6riot Samuel Corum/Getty Images

    America’s Broken Civic Bargain

    J. Bradford DeLong worries that Republicans have abandoned one of the core principles that sustains a democracy over time.

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