In this outstanding and original book, Hwang analyzes North Korea’s nuclear diplomacy under three leaders during the nuclear crises on the Korean peninsula since the early 1990s. He challenges the realist and liberal approaches dominating scholarly and policy discourses and offers an alternative approach based on prospect theory. The book argues that North Korea’s leaders are risk-acceptant or risk-averse according to their perception of gains and losses in international and domestic environments. As a result, North Korea has moved between engagement and confrontation with the US when its supreme leader has perceived North Korea's security predicament to be deteriorating. Hwang explains why Kim Il Sung changed North Korea's nuclear policy from confrontation to engagement (risk-aversion), signing the June 1994 Agreed Framework with the US. The second nuclear crisis under Kim Jong Il witnessed a sharp change in nuclear policy from confrontation (withdrawal from the Non-Proliferation Treaty) to engagement (Six-Party Talks) back to confrontation. Lastly, Hwang discusses North Korea's nuclear risk-taking attitudes under Kim Jong Un, including the failed summits with the US and the return to a confrontation policy toward the US. A useful addition to Jun Taek Kwon and Weiqi Zhang's Strategies of Survival (CH, Apr'24, 61-2307). Highly recommended. Advanced undergraduates through faculty; practitioners.
