A Mason Impact Project mini grant, made by the Office of the Provost and Executive Vice President Mark Ginsberg, has allowed a team of Mason Korea students and one Mason Korea alumna to launch the CSPS-Korea Knowledge in Motion Series.
Housed in the Schar School of Policy and Government, the Center for Security Policy Studies (CSPS) offers intellectual space for Mason students and faculty to work alongside government, military, think tank, and private sector experts to address today’s pressing security issues, advancing the study and practice of strategic thinking for new national and global policy ideas. CSPS considers issues ranging from so-called ‘traditional’ threats, including great power conflict, civil war, nuclear proliferation, and terrorism, to so-called ‘nontraditional’ threats, including climate change, pandemic disease, demographic shifts, extreme poverty, state failure ,and refugee crises.
CSPS seeks to produce multidisciplinary, policy-relevant research by leveraging experts from across George Mason University, transcending disciplinary boundaries. The center also sponsors innovative extracurricular activities for Mason students to prepare them for service as tomorrow’s security scholars and leaders.
The director of the Center for Security Policy Studies at the Mason Korea Campus (CSPS-Korea) is Assistant Global Affairs Professor Soyoung Kwon, currently on research leave with the Global Affairs program at Mason’s Fairfax campus.
CSPS-Korea hosted a seminar on refugees in late November, 2021, which featured a Knowledge in Motion documentary film screening and discussion on the theme of 'Refugees: Our Unfounded Fears.' The event was planned and conducted by a team of student CSPS-Korea fellows, and launched a seminar series that will be held annually.
Acting CSPS-Korea Director, Assistant Global Affairs Professor Ji Hye Lim, said that the event was an opportunity to raise awareness of the international refugee issue through the film and a panel discussion on the human rights and treatment of refugees. Incheon, home of the Mason Korea Campus, aims to become an international city; it is considered as one of the cities that has received the most internally displaced people in Korea during the division of South and North Korea and the Korean War.
The CPSP-Korea program was recognized in print and online by the Incheon Ilbo news outlet.
January 10, 2022
