Dr. Haksoon Paik is the Executive Director of the “Kim Dae-jung Peace Forum” and a member of Board of Directors of the Kim Dae-jung Peace Center—the memorial center for Dr. Kim Dae-jung, the late South Korean President and the 2000 Nobel Peace Prize laureate. Dr. Paik, most recently, was President of the Sejong Institute, an independent think tank in South Korea. He was formerly an advisor in various capacities to South Korea’s Ministry of Unification, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and National Assembly. He was the Executive Director of the Seoul-Washington Forum, the Chairman of the Policy Committee of the Korea Council for Reconciliation and Cooperation, a news commentator for the Korean Broadcasting System (KBS), and a columnist for major Korean national newspapers. He was a Vice President of Korean Political Science Association and also a Vice President of the Korean Association of North Korean Studies. Dr. Paik has written extensively on North Korean politics, inter-Korean relations, North Korea-U.S. relations, North Korean nuclear and missile issues, and East Asian international relations. He is author of numerous books and monographs written in Korean, including: Park Geun-hye Administration’s Policy on North Korea and Unification: Comparison with Previous Administrations (2018), North Korean Politics in the Kim Jong Un Era, 2012-2014: Ideas, Identities, and Structures (2015), The U.S.-North Korea Relations During President Obama's Second Term, 2013-2014: Threat of the Use of Nuclear Weapons and the Collapse of Relations (2014), The U.S.-North Korea Relations during President Obama’s First Term, 2009-2012 (2012), and The History of Power in North Korea: Ideas, Identities, and Structures (2010). His most recent published articles and book chapters include: “The Great Transformation for Peace in the Korean Peninsula: Why Peace?” (forthcoming), “Inside Kim Jong Un’s Assertive Mind” (2017) and “Kim Jong Un’s Leadership in Diplomacy, Security Affairs, and National Unification” (2017). Dr. Paik earned his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Pennsylvania and was a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard University.