Sung Deuk Hahm
Sung Deuk Hahm is Dean of the Graduate School of Political Studies and Naun Chair Professor of Political Science and Law at Kyonggi University. Concurrently, he is a co-chairman of the advisory committee of the World Gyeongju Forum, a follow up platform of the APEC South Korea 2025. Hosted by the North Gyeongsang Province and sponsored by the Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism, the WGF has served as an international forum to discuss policies in the cultural industries with world-class experts.
He is a Korean political scientist, well known for his work on the Korean Presidency.
He has been a friend and adviser to every president from current Lee Jae-myung to Chun Doo-hwan. He is also the chairman of the Korean Institute for Presidential Studies, an independent research foundation which evaluates the presidential performance and the editor-in-chief of the Korean Presidential Studies Series of the Nanam Publishing House.
Education
He received his BA in political science and international studies from Yonsei University with highest honors in 1985 and MA in public affairs from the University of Texas at Austin with the Lyndon B. Johnson Foundation Academic Excellence Award in 1989. He was a member of Phi Kappa Phi honor society. He received his Ph.D. in political economy from Carnegie Mellon University with the guidance of Nobel Laureate Herbert Simon in 1993.During the completion of his dissertation, he was an assistant professor of public administration of the John D. Rockefeller IV School of Policy and Politics at West Virginia University as well as a research associate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Center for Public Affairs. He received the Raymond Vernon Memorial Award for the best article in the 1992 Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. He also received the Outstanding Dissertation Award from the Network of Schools of Public Policy, Affairs, and Administration in 1993.
Career
After receiving his Ph.D. in 1993, he became an assistant professor of public policy and business administration of the McCourt School of Public Policy and the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. He was a Program Chair of the 1997 Annual Conference of the American Society of Public Administration.Since returning to South Korea in 1997, he has been Professor and Chairman of the Department of Public Administration, Associate Dean of the College of Political Science and Economics, and Director of the Korea University-Bar-Ilan University of Israel program at Korea University. In 2021, he has been named the 16th Dean of the Graduate School of Political Studies at Kyonggi University. He was also appointed as the Naun Professor of Political Science and Law, a chair awarded by the Naun Foundation to Kyonggi University in 2023.
Professionally, he is currently the Special Advisor to Governor Lee Cheol-woo of the North Gyeongsang Province. He was the APEC Korea 2025 Ambassador for the North Gyeongsang Province. He is also a member of executive board of TriGem Computer Co., Ltd.. He was a member of executive board of the Korea Land & Housing Corporation, the largest public corporation in Asia.
In addition, he was a founding executive director of the Incheon Security Conference of the Incheon Metropolitan City. The purpose of ISC is to commemorate the victory of the Incheon Landing Operation, also known as Operation Chromite in September 15, 1950. He was also a member of the Special Committee for the Constitutional Revision at the Korean National Assembly.
Research
His research interests are in the areas of Korean Presidency, Korean politics, international political economy, public budgeting and finance, and industrial policy. He has published 18 books and over 150 articles in edited volumes and scholarly journals such as Comparative Politics, Comparative Political Studies, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, and Public Administration Review.He was the editor-in-chief of Korean Social Science Journal published by the Korean Social Science Research Council, Korea Journal published by the UNESCO-Korea Commission, and International Review of Public Administration published by the Korean Association of Public Administration. He was a co-editor of International Public Management Journal, an associate editor of Administration & Society, and the managing editor of Governance (journal). Currently, he is a member of the editorial boards of Governance (journal) and Korea Observer.
Selected publications
Books
• Presidential Crisis in Korea. Seoul: Cheong Media, 2024.• The End of Imperial President in Korea. Seoul: Sum & Sum, 2017.
• Owner's Manual for the Successful President Elect. Seoul: Nanam Publishing House, 2013.
Outstanding Academic Book Award, Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports, Tourism, 2013
• The Korean Presidency. Seoul: Nanam Publishing House, 2016; 2002; 1999.
Outstanding Academic Book Award, Korean National Academy of Sciences, 2002
• After Development: The Transformation of the Korean Presidency and Bureaucracy. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 1997.
Articles
• 2025. Journal of Asian and African Affairs 60: 157-178.• 2024. Korea Observer 55: 273-296
• 2020. Journal of Asian and African Affairs 55: 1128-1142.
• 2018. Journal of Asian and African Affairs 53: 649-665.