Charles King Armstrong (born February 11, 1962) is an American historian of North Korea. From 2005 to 2020, he worked as the Korea Foundation Professor of Korean Studies at Columbia University, spending his last year on sabbatical after the university's determination that he had committed extensive plagiarism. Armstrong's works dealt with revolutions, cultures of socialism, architectural history, and diplomatic history in the contexts of East Asia and modern Korea, with a focus on North Korea.
His 2013 book, Tyranny of the Weak, won the John K. Fairbank Prize, but he returned it in 2017 after the American Historical Association asked him to account for issues with the citations, including plagiarism and source fabrication. He was investigated by Columbia in 2020 relating to rape accusations from a student, where he was found guilty of "harassment" and violating school policy prohibiting sexual relations of professors with students. [1] [ failed verification ] He left Columbia in June 2020.
Armstrong earned his B.A. in Chinese Studies (having transferred from East Asian studies during his first year) at Yale University in 1984, and continued his studies for two years at Yonsei University in Seoul, earning a diploma in Korean language in 1986. He next spent a year in Northeast China teaching English at Jilin University and then went onto study for an M.Sc. at the London School of Economics in 1988. He earned his Ph.D. in Korean Studies at the University of Chicago in 1994 under Bruce Cumings, a noted historian of Korean Studies. [2]
Charles Armstrong is a specialist in the modern history of Korea and East Asia, and has written or edited numerous books on modern and contemporary Korea as well as the wider East Asia region (including Vietnam and Japan) and the Cold War.
He joined the Columbia faculty in 1996 and before leaving in 2020, taught courses on Korean history, U.S.-East Asian relations, the Vietnam War, and approaches to international and global history.
His book The North Korean Revolution, 1945–1950, published in 2003, was based largely on captured North Korean documents in the U.S. National Archives, and was a step forward for efforts to understand North Korea more at the local level and beyond more conventional Cold War or Korean War-centered approaches. [3] He has published articles in peer-reviewed journals on such subjects as Kim Il Sung's Manchurian guerrilla heritage, [4] the "cultural Cold War" in Korea, [5] and assessments of North Korean studies as a whole. [6]
He was a visiting professor in 2008 at the Graduate School of International Studies at Seoul National University, has given keynote lectures at major Asian studies conferences, [7] and is a regular fixture in US media coverage of the Korean peninsula, including documentary film and television. [8] [9]
In 2013, Charles Armstrong's book Tyranny of the Weak: North Korea and the World, 1950–1992 was published by Cornell University Press. The book sought to reassess North Korean foreign policy in the Cold War. The book received positive reviews, particularly because it appeared to draw from so many foreign archives and materials in multiple languages including Russian, Chinese, German, and Korean. The book was the 2014 winner of the John K. Fairbank Prize, given to the best book in East Asian History by the American Historical Association. [10]
Beginning in September 2016, the book was severely criticized by a number of North Korea scholars (Andrei Lankov, Balázs Szalontai, Brian Myers, Fyodor Tertitskiy and others) for deceptive scholarship. [11] [12] [13] [14] Szalontai asserted that many parts of the text closely resemble text in Szalontai's Kim Il Sung in the Khrushchev Era and were supported by documents that either did not exist or were completely unrelated to the subject. [15] Szalontai compiled a table of 76 problematic cases [16] and later expanded the table to include 90 of such cases. [17]
Soon after the allegations were made public, Armstrong responded to NK News that he "did not comment on any specific issues critics have raised with the book". [11] On December 30, 2016, Armstrong directly addressed the issues raised by the critics, stating: "For those who find the book flawed, inaccurate or insufficiently researched, the answer is simple: write a better book." [18] Armstrong stated that he had submitted 52 corrections to Tyranny of the Weak to the publisher Cornell University Press and these would be included in the next printing of the book. [18] The press confirmed this with a single tweet on January 11, 2017, saying "Charles Armstrong responds to critics, issues corrections to Tyranny of the Weak" and linking to Armstrong's blog post. [19] However, Armstrong later deleted the post and his entire blog. [20]
In June 2017, Armstrong returned the John King Fairbank Prize to the American Historical Association in response to critical queries made by the association. In its press release, the association stated that they had "identified a set of citations that did not meet professional standards" and that "Dr. Armstrong has corrected the citation errors and, out of respect for the AHA, has returned the Fairbank Prize." [21] Columbia University made no statement at this time, but did announce on June 1 that Armstrong had been awarded a 2017 President's Global Innovation Fund Grant for work with Joseph Terwilliger on exchanges with North Korean physicians. [22]
The return of the prize prompted the head of Cornell University Press to state in early July 2017 that the press would imminently issue a revised edition of the book. [23] The new edition of the book appeared in the summer of 2017, without any formal announcement from the press. The new text contained few changes to the prose, but did feature changes to dozens of footnotes now citing Szalontai's Kim Il Sung in the Khrushchev Era rather than archival documents. It also included two new sentences from Armstrong in the front matter of the text: "I would like to add a special note of thanks to Dr. Balázs Szalontai, whose pioneering research was insufficiently acknowledged in the prior printing of this book and who pointed out to me numerous attribution errors in chapters 2 and 3. I apologize for my previous oversights and gratefully acknowledge Dr. Szalontai's assistance in correcting these errors."
A short review of the controversy was published in a collective blog Retraction Watch. [24] [25] It was also covered by South Korean media, [26] [27] Chinese media, [28] and the New York Post. [29]
In an extensive interview in December 2019, Szalontai revealed that Armstrong had not worked in any Russian archives at all, and said "some of the East German sources [in Tyranny of the Weak] are fake, some are not fake," and further discussed some of the efforts by Andrei Lankov and other scholars to methodically check Armstrong's suspicious sources. [30]
In February 2020, Armstrong's 2005 article: "'Fraternal Socialism': The International Reconstruction of North Korea, 1953–62", published in the journal Cold War History, was retracted for plagiarism from Szalontai's book. [31] [32]
On September 10, 2019, Columbia University released a letter to faculty explaining that it had concluded a multi-part formal investigation of Armstrong's research conduct and determined that he had committed plagiarism. It further announced that Armstrong would retire at the end of 2020. [33] He left the university in June 2020.
According to documents obtained by journalists Khadija Hussein and Karen Xia, Columbia's investigation concluded in January 2019 and its scope extended back to Armstrong's tenure file submitted in 2003. [33] That tenure file included draft chapters of what would ultimately become Armstrong's book Tyranny of the Weak. According to Balázs Szalontai, who obtained a copy of the investigation's draft report in 2018, [34] the investigation found evidence in the tenure file that Armstrong had plagiarized Szalontai's dissertation. [35] A partial copy of an earlier draft of Columbia's investigation report was made public by the Retraction Watch website on September 20, 2019. [36]
A female student enrolled in Armstrong's 2014 Global Scholars summer course accused Armstrong of rape in 2020. [37] [1] According to the university's student newspaper Columbia Spectator , Armstrong responded that the sex was consensual. [37] Columbia University's Office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action conducted an internal investigation of the accusation and found Armstrong guilty of harassment and of violating the university policy prohibiting relationships between professors and students.
Monographs
John King Fairbank was an American historian of China and United States–China relations. He taught at Harvard University from 1936 until his retirement in 1977. He is credited with building the field of China studies in the United States after World War II with his organizational ability, his mentorship of students, support of fellow scholars, and formulation of basic concepts to be tested.
Bruce Cumings is an American historian of East Asia, professor, lecturer and author. He is the Gustavus F. and Ann M. Swift Distinguished Service Professor in History, and the former chair of the history department at the University of Chicago. He formerly taught at Northwestern University and the University of Washington. He specializes in modern Korean history and contemporary international relations.
Korean studies is an academic discipline that focuses on the study of Korea, which includes South Korea, North Korea, and diasporic Korean populations. Areas commonly included under this rubric include Korean history, Korean culture, Korean literature, Korean art, Korean music, Korean language and linguistics, Korean sociology and anthropology, Korean politics, Korean economics, Korean folklore, Korean ethnomusicology and increasingly study of Korean popular culture. It may be compared to other area studies disciplines, such as American studies and Chinese studies. Korean studies is sometimes included within a broader regional area of focus including "East Asian studies".
Brian Reynolds Myers, usually cited as B. R. Myers, is an American professor of international studies at Dongseo University in Busan, South Korea, best known for his writings on North Korean propaganda. He is a contributing editor for The Atlantic and an opinion columnist for The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. Myers is the author of Han Sǒrya and North Korean Literature, A Reader's Manifesto, The Cleanest Race, and North Korea's Juche Myth.
Brian Wansink is an American former professor and researcher who worked in consumer behavior and marketing research. He was the executive director of the USDA's Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion (CNPP) from 2007 to 2009 and held the John S. Dyson Endowed Chair in the Applied Economics and Management Department at Cornell University, where he directed the Cornell Food and Brand Lab.
Iran–North Korea relations are described as being positive by official news agencies of the two countries. Diplomatic relations improved following the Iranian Revolution in 1979 and the establishment of an Islamic Republic. Iran and North Korea pledge cooperation in educational, scientific, and cultural spheres. Some media reports claim this cooperation extends to nuclear cooperation, though official U.S. government publications and academic studies have disputed this. The United States has been greatly concerned by North Korea's arms deals with Iran, which started during the 1980s with North Korea acting as a third party in arms deals between the Communist bloc and Iran, as well as selling domestically produced weapons to Iran, and North Korea continues selling missiles to Iran. North Korea and Iran are the remaining two members of George W. Bush's "Axis of evil", which has led to many of the concerns regarding Iran–North Korea relations.
Mongolia–North Korea relations are the historic and current bilateral relations between Mongolia and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
Pak Chang-ok was a North Korean official and was a leader of the Soviet Korean faction of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK), with members being mainly ethnic Koreans born in Soviet Union, after the suicide of their first leader, Ho Ka-i.
The Blue House raid, also known in South Korea as the 21 January Incident, was a raid launched by North Korean commandos in an attempt to assassinate President of South Korea Park Chung Hee in his residence at the Blue House in Seoul, on 21 January, 1968. A 31-man team of the Korean People's Army (KPA) infiltrated the DMZ but was intercepted by police near the presidential residence. In the ensuing pursuit, all but two commandos were killed; one was captured, and one fled back to North Korea. South Korean casualties totaled 26 killed and 66 wounded, including about 24 civilians; four Americans also were killed. Park was unharmed.
The Korean Christian Federation is a Protestant body in North Korea founded in 1946. The federation is based in the capital city Pyongyang. The current secretary general is O Kyong-u. The federation has come to play an important role in international relations involving North Korea and religious organizations in South Korea and abroad.
North Vietnam, officially the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, was a socialist state in Southeast Asia that existed from 1945 to 1976, with formal sovereignty being fully recognized in 1954. A member of the Eastern Bloc, it opposed the French-supported State of Vietnam and later the Western-allied Republic of Vietnam. The DRV emerged victorious over South Vietnam in 1975 and ceased to exist the following year when it unified with the south to become the current Socialist Republic of Vietnam.
Paul A. Cohen is Edith Stix Wasserman Professor of Asian Studies and History Emeritus at Wellesley College and Associate of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University. His research interests include 19th-20th century China; historical thought; American historiography on China.
The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves and Why it Matters is a 2010 book by Brian Reynolds Myers. Based on a study of the propaganda produced in North Korea for internal consumption, Myers argues that the guiding ideology of North Korea is a race-based far-right nationalism derived from Japanese fascism, rather than any form of communism. The book is based on author's study of the material in the Information Center on North Korea.
The John K. Fairbank Prize in East Asian History is offered annually for an outstanding book in the history of China proper, Vietnam, Chinese Central Asia, Mongolia, Manchuria, Korea, or Japan, substantially after 1800. It honors the late John K. Fairbank, Francis Lee Higginson Professor of History and director of the East Asian Research Center at Harvard University, and president of the American Historical Association in 1968. Only books of high scholarly and literary merit will be considered. Anthologies, edited works, and pamphlets are ineligible for the competition.
North Korea and the former country North Vietnam established formal diplomatic relations on January 31, 1950. In July 1957, North Vietnam President Ho Chi Minh visited North Korea; North Korean prime minister Kim Il Sung visited North Vietnam in November–December 1958 and November 1964. In February 1961, the two governments concluded an agreement on scientific and technical cooperation. North Vietnam merged with South Vietnam in 1976 to become the modern country of Vietnam.
Central African Republic–North Korea relations refers to the current and historical relationship between the Central African Republic and the North Korea (DPRK). Neither country maintains an embassy in their respective capitals.
Sheila Miyoshi Jager is an American historian. She is a Professor of East Asian Studies at Oberlin College, author of two books on Korea, co-editor of a third book on Asian nations in the post-Cold War era, and a forthcoming book on great power competition in northeast Asia at the turn of the 19th-20th century. She is a well-known historian of Korea and East Asia.
Egypt–North Korea relations refer to the bilateral relations between Egypt and North Korea. Egypt has an embassy in Pyongyang whilst North Korea has an embassy in Cairo.
Ghana and North Korea established diplomatic relations in 1964.
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