Peter Banseok Kwon 권반석

On Fulbright research leave during Academic Year 2024-2025 

As a historian of modern Korea, Professor Kwon’s research focuses on military-civilian relations in the course of South Korea’s military modernization and the interface of these dynamics with the nation’s postwar political, social, technological, and economic development. His broader interests include militarization and development, global militarism, Korean nationalism, security and technology, the legacy of military regimes, authoritarianism and civil society, and comparative industrialization in East Asia. His interests also include the connections between Christianity and social movements, as well as North Korea’s ideological development.

Professor Kwon is the author of Cornerstone of the Nation: The Defense Industry and the Building of Modern Korea under Park Chung Hee (Harvard University Asia Center, 2024), which examines the origins and development of South Korea’s defense industry during Park Chung Hee’s rule and its impact on the nation’s socio-economic and military transformation. (E-book available on Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble.) As a Fulbright US Scholar in South Korea for the 2024-2025 academic year, he is currently working on his second book, Column of the Nation: The Yulgok Operation and South Korea’s Global Rise, which investigates the Yulgok Operation and its multifaceted role in South Korea’s national development trajectory.