Jungwon Huh & Juyoung Jang. 2024. Perceived Immigrant Threats and Multicultural Acceptance: Concrete and Abstract Perceptions. Space & Environment, 34(3), 8-33
This study aims to analyze the factors influencing negative attitudes toward immigrants in Korean society and to explore effective strategies to enhance multicultural acceptance. Based on a nationwide survey of 4,000 participants, the study examined how demographic background variables, immigrant-related factors, and regional factors affect attitudes toward immigrants. The analysis revealed that the influence of demographic background and regional composition on the acceptance of immigrants was minimal. Furthermore, concrete perceptions of threats were found to have a much weaker explanatory power for immigrant acceptance compared to abstract perceptions. This suggests that when considering the acceptance and coexistence of immigrants in a given area, vague anxieties have a greater impact than specific considerations of the size or actual influence of immigrants in that region.
Juyoung Jang & Jungwon Huh. 2024. Examining Immigrant Parent Sponsorship Policy Through Family Unification and Care Lens. Multiculture & Peace, 18(1), 80-104
This study investigated attitudes concerning the immigrants’ invitation of foreign parents and analyzed migration policies regarding the reunification of elderly parents. Sponsoring elderly parents is a significant factor in facilitating immigrants' integration in certain countries. The research delved into attitudes regarding support obligations towards elderly parents, particularly focusing on China, Vietnam, and Japan, the primary sending countries for immigrants in Korea, to gauge their potential needs. To assess public consensus on inviting immigrant parents, we examined attitudes toward the relationships between adult children and their parents and towards the invitation of immigrant parents. Recent policies in Canada and New Zealand were compared to those in Korea regarding family sponsorship. Suggestions were made for future policy revisions based on these findings.
Jungwon Huh & Abhisheka Dubey. 2021. COVID-19 vaccination campaign trends and challenges in select Asian countries. Asian Journal of Political Science, 29(3)
How successful have countries in Asia been at vaccinating their populations against COVID-19? What explains the broadly similar pace of rollout across countries in the region despite diverse governance capacities, demographic compositions, resources and economies? This paper presents a comparative analysis of the planning and implementation of national vaccination drives against COVID-19 across 21 South and East Asian countries. We advance an analytical framework to understand the different challenges countries encounter and distinguish three key factors on both the national and international level—vaccine shortages, governance capacity for mass vaccination and vaccine hesitancy. We apply the analytical framework to national vaccination drives, offering a snapshot of countries’ vaccination progress as of early 2021, and conclude with general trends for the COVID-19 vaccine rollout across the region.
Jungwon Huh. 2023. The Korean Efforts to Virtual Solidarity toward Myanmar Democratization: An Analysis of Social Media. Multiculture & Peace, 17(3), 237-257
This study used Google search history and social media data to assess the trend of Korean support for the pro-democracy movement in Myanmar. We looked at the elements that affect international civil society's support for the pro-democracy movement in Myanmar in Korea. First, we discovered that, in contrast to Google's global search trends, which indicated a considerable increase in search volume shortly after the coup, interest in Myanmar remained constant during the first half of 2021 in South Korea. Second, compared to the same time last year, South Korean Twitter activity supporting democracy in Myanmar exploded. Third, the recall of the Gwangju Democracy Movement first surfaced in citizen discourse before news publications, and it was the top trending search phrase for Myanmar. Finally, statements of solidarity from the South Korean government and politicians had a greater impact on social media volume than news about the situation on the ground in Myanmar. Future research should analyze cyber-active solidarity for democratization in Asia, such as the Milk Tea Movement, and explore the sustainability of cross-referencing and solidarity across time and space.
Juyoung Jang & Jungwon Huh. 2023. The Review of Statistics on Immigrants to Inform the Evidence-based Immigration Policy. Space & Environment, 33(3), 97-125
This study reviewed current statistics on immigrants in Korea, focusing on administrative data sets and survey data by governments. First, we analyzed the definitions of immigrants and the characteristics of administrative data across ministries. Then, we compared three survey data regarding their comparability. The study aimed to provide implications for advancing immigrant-related statistics through the review. Significant issues and suggestions found in our review are as follows. First, the definitions of immigrants and related statistics they provide are inconsistent for use, leading to inappropriate use of the statistics or their interpretations. Second, surveys on immigrants are not comparable with each other or with surveys on the natives. Third, developing panel surveys to understand immigrants’ settlement processes in Korea is critical. Fourth, surveys reviewed in the current study rarely provide residential information, resulting in a lack of understanding of immigrants’ lives in local areas. Fifth, the surveys targeted documented immigrants and naturalized citizens, resulting in missing information on undocumented immigrants for policy development. Lastly, it is crucial to provide details of the statistics and data promptly.
Su Hyun Youk & Jungwon Huh. 2020. Long-term Family Visit and Vietnamese Female Marriage Migrants’ Family Dynamics. Contemporary Society and Multiculture, 10(3), 81-129
This study explores the shared experience of Vietnamese female marriage migrants and their invited families during their stay in Korea. This study analyzed various issues around their experience and intention of inviting their original families in Vietnam using 2018 National Survey of Multicultural Families. Also the study conducted semi-structured interviews with 17 Vietnamese marriage migrants and their invited families. The study found that emotional support from invited families was crucial to Vietnamese marriage migrants and the instrumental support from invited families have made them enable to spend time in developing strong bonding with their husbands and engaging actively with their Vietnamese and Korean communities. Family reunification through Long-term family VISA made the positive effect on family dynamics of Vietnamese marriage migrants’ families and created unique opportunity for promoting the empowerment of Vietnamese marriage migrants.
Jungwon Huh. 2020. The Effects of Resource Availability and Neighborhood Characteristics on the Low-Income Single Mothers’ Welfare Use. The Geographical Journal of Korea , 54(3), 97-125
This study investigated the effects of neighborhood characteristics and accessibility to quality child care and social services on the exit of low-income mothers from Work First in North Carolina. The neighborhood has long been considered critical to the well-being of marginalized populations in the social work field, but not fully investigated due to methodological limitations. Given the expanded funding for Child Care Subsidy under the Post-Welfare Reform era, the effect of the physical accessibility to subsidized childcare is more critical to the usage of high-quality childcare of low-income mothers than ever. This study employed the Geographic Information System to calculate the physical accessibility to quality child care and social resources in the neighborhood. It analyzed the effects of resource availability and neighborhood characteristics on welfare exit using survival analysis and multi-level analysis. The findings are as follows. First, the lengths of Work First stay were different by participants’ age, the number of children she had, and the driving time to quality child care and other social services. Second, the effects of physical access to quality child care and neighborhood affluence on the length of Work First stay varied by participants’ race/ethnic groups. Then, discussion and implication follow.
Jungwon Huh & Juyoung Jang. 2020. Mapping Community-level Mobility Changes of Koreans and Immigrants using Bigdata of "de Facto Population of Seoul": Six Ethnic Enclaves in Seoul under COVID-19 Epidemic. Space & Environment, 30(3), 99-137
The study attempted to examine the mobility after the COVID-19 crisis in ethnic enclaves and the areas with a high foreign resident population in the Seoul Metropolitan area. De facto population data of Seoul using LTE signals were utilized to investigate the mobility changes between Korean natives and foreign residents in six target areas. Data from November 2019 to June 2020 were selected for analyses--the analysis of de facto population changes at four-time points per day across the target period and the total daily de facto population compared to that of early November 2019 as the reference. For Korean natives, the de facto population in all target areas had declined, especially after spikes of confirmed cases or the Korean government issuing public health orders. On the other hand, foreign residents’ patterns of de facto population change differed across the target areas with varying compositions of foreign residents. Target areas with a high proportion of international students had similar mobility patterns between Korean natives and foreign residents. Target areas with ethnic enclaves, on the other hand, revealed distinctive mobility patterns of foreign residents form Korean natives. mplications of these findings for future research are suggested.
Kilkon Ko, Jungwon Huh & Jeongmin Park. 2021. Comparative Study of the Trend and Policy: Response of COVID-19 in Global Cities. Journal of Local Government Studies, 33(2), 93-118
This study aims to analyze the trend and policy response of metropolises to COVID-19 to understand their similarity and heterogeneity among different countries and cities. Despite the limitation of data availability, we select 9 cities (Jakarta, Delhi, Manila, London, Paris, New York, Tokyo, and Seoul) and compare the city-level to national-level responses. The results of the study are as follows. First, the infection trend of COVID-19 was different from that of the traditional SIR (susceptible, infection, and recovery) model. The size and wave pattern, and degree of irregularity of the infection differed across the metropolises. Second, we falsified the claim that metropolises are the hub of the spread of COVID-19 in a country. Instead of unidirectional transmission of COVID-19, both cities and countries mutually affect each other in the spread of COVID-19. Third, unsustainable policies such as containment or movement restrictions had limitations in preventing the spread of COVID-19. In addition, we present the importance of preemptive responses in the early phase of spread. Fourth, the degree of decline in fatality in big cities was greater than that of the country. In this respect, we conclude that big cities are in a better situation in terms of learning and resilience.