Clint Work

Clint received his B.A. from Boston College, with a double major in Philosophy and Political Science and a minor in History. He went on to receive his M.A. from the University of Chicago’s Committee on International Relations (CIR), where he studied modern U.S.-East Asia relations and South Korean political economy. Following this, he worked in the International Crisis Group’s (ICG) Seoul office.

Currently, as a Ph.D. candidate at the Jackson School, his work broadly focuses on South Korea’s foreign and national security policy, Korean political culture, U.S.-Korean relations, and U.S. foreign policy. More specifically, his dissertation research and writing centers on U.S.-Korean relations under President Jimmy Carter in the late 1970s and Carter’s abortive withdrawal of U.S. ground combat forces from South Korea. He has several academic publications. In addition, he has written for more popular, non-academic outlets, such as The Diplomat, Sino-NK, and the Peterson Institute for International Economics’ North Korea: Witness to Transformation blog. He recently became the regular foreign and national security policy writer for The Diplomat’s Koreas Page.

Publications

• Work, Clint. May, 2018. “U.S. Soldiers Might Be Stuck In Korea Forever.” Foreign Policy
• Work, Clint. March, 2018. “Why North Korea Will Never Attack the United States.” The Washington Post
• Work, Clint. February, 2018. “When the U.S. Almost Withdrew From South Korea.” The Diplomat Magazine: Issue 39
• Work, Clint. January, 2018. “Japan and South Korea in the Shadow of History.” The Diplomat Magazine: Issue 38
• Work, Clint, 2017. “Stable Imperatives, Shifting Strategies: Reagan and Democracy Promotion in South Korea.” In The Reagan Administration, the Cold War and the transition to Democracy Promotion, edited by W.M. Schmidt and Robert Pee. Palgrave (forthcoming)
• Work, Clint. December, 2017. “The Resilient US-South Korea Alliance.” The Diplomat Magazine: Issue 37
• Work, Clint. November, 2017. “The Long History of South Korea’s OPCON Debate.” The Diplomat 
• Work, Clint. June, 2016. “Changing Context, Persistent Frames: The United States and The Absence of Multilateral Institutions in Post-Cold War East Asia.” Asian International Studies Review, 17.2 
• Clint Work. Non-Traditional Security Issues in North Korea (Review). The Journal of Korean Studies. Vol. 21, no.1 (Spring).7. 2016. 
• Clint Work. and Pinkston, Daniel A.  “New Realities, Old Fears: Escalation on the Korean Peninsula.” The Diplomat. Jan 28, 2016.
• Clint Work. “Moral Hazard and the US-ROK Alliance.” The Diplomat. Nov 10, 2015.
• Clint Work.  “Park Geun-hye’s Visit and the US-ROK Alliance.” The  Diplomat. Oct, 06, 2015. 
• Clint Work.  “Korea and the New Regional Paradigm.” The Diplomat. Apr 24, 2015.
• Clint Work. “South Korea: Dependence in the Age of OPCON.” The Diplomat. Jul 09, 2014.
• Clint Work. “North Korea & Human Rights: Tolerating the Intolerable.” The Diplomat. Mar 26, 2014.
• Clint Work. “Cold War Structures and Tectonic Shifts.”The Diplomat. Feb 21, 2014.
• Clint Work. “East Asia’s Discourse Problem.”The Diplomat. Mar 07, 2014.

Grants & Fellowships

• SSI (Space Security Initiative) Junior Fellow, IPI, University of Washington, 2015-2016.
• George W. Long Fellowship, University of Washington, 2014-2015.
• Richard B. Wesley Endowment Ph.D. Fellowship, University of Washington, 2014-2015.
• Summer FLAS Fellowship, University of Washington, Summer, 2015.
• Academic Year FLAS, University of Washington, 2015-2016.
• University of Chicago, M.A. in International Relations, Graduate with Honors Distinction, 2012-2013.
• Boston College, Dean’s List, 2002-2006.