North Korea Research Group

Gregory T. Chin (Ph.D., York University) is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Department of Political Science at York University (Canada), where he teaches global politics and East Asian political economy. Dr. Chin is a Senior Fellow of the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI), and Research Fellow of The Asian Institute at the University of Toronto. He has held a visiting fellowship at Peking University (1997-98). Prior to joining York University in 2006, Dr. Chin served as a diplomat in the Canadian Embassy in China, responsible for Canadian foreign aid to China and North Korea.

From 2000 to 2003, he was Senior Programme Officer in the China and Northeast Asian Division of the Canadian International Development Agency; and a Senior International Affairs Analyst and Trade Commissioner in Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Bureau of North Asia and Pacific Affairs.

His current research includes comparative analysis of international economic integration in China and North Korea, and industrial development in Asian communist transitions. He has recently published in Asian Perspective and contributed chapters in edited books including Globalization and China’s Reforms (Routledge, 2007, edited by David Zweig). Dr. Chin recently completed a collaborative research project for the the International Development Research Centre on the Role of Emerging Donors in Development Assistance.

Professor Hsiung's research interests include feminist theories; feminist methodology and epistemology; gender relations in Chinese societies; women organizing in contemporary china; and international gender politics. An associate professor at the Asian Institute, professor Hsiung teaches qualitative methods in social sciences; family and social change; gender and information technology; and gender issues in the east asian societies.

Ito Peng (Ph.D., London School of Economics) is an Associate Professor at the Department of Sociology, and the Director of Dr. David Chu Chair Program in Asia Pacific Studies at Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto. She teaches in areas of comparative social policy, gender and family policy, and health and social policy, with area focus in Northern East Asia, Canada, and Southern Mediterranean. Her current research includes: 1) welfare state responses to post-industrial pressures in Japan, Korea, Italy, and Spain, which compares recent social policy reforms in these countries in response to economic globalization, demographic shifts, changes in family and gender relations, and domestic political changes; 2) political economy of welfare state transformations in East Asia, which looks at how economic globalization is affecting changes in labor market structures and social and economic policy reforms in Japan and South Korea; and 3) immigrant women's health and its policy implications in Ontario.

Professor Peng is a coordinator of Canada-Korea Social Policy Research Cooperation, with research links with Seoul National University, Yonsei University, Korea University, KWDI, KIHASA, Korean Ministry of Health and Welfare, and Foreign Affairs Canada. She is also a member of Social Policy and Development Project with the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development.

Don Rickerd, Graduate of Queen's University, Balliol College, Oxford and Osgoode Hall Law School. Formerly Master of Winters College, York University and President of the Donner Canadian Foundation and the Max Bell Foundation. Currently Associate Director, Asian Business and Management Program, York University.

Andre Schmid (Ph.D., Columbia University) is an Associate Professor in the Dept. of East Asian Studies. His current research interests include the history of the cultural Cold War in the post-Korean War peninsula as well as early twentieth century peasant movements.

He is the author of Korea Between Empires, 1895-1919 (Columbia University Press), winner of the Association of Asian Studies John Whitney Hall award, and has published in journals such as Journal of Asian Studies, South Atlantic Quarterly, and Yoksa munje yon’gu.

Joe Wong (Ph.D., Wisconsin-Madison) is associate professor of Political Science and current Director of the Asian Institute. His current research interests include social welfare, particularly in the area of health care, as well as post-industrial policy such as in health biotechnologies. In addition to publishing widely in academic journals, Prof. Wong is the author of Healthy Democracies: Welfare Politics in Taiwan and South Korea. (Cornell University Press).