Elaine Lee
College of Arts and Sciences
2019

Elaine is majoring in International Relations and East Asian Area Studies, and minoring in music. In addition to being a Kim Program Undergraduate Fellow, she is a political science research assistant, senior staffer for the International Affairs Association, a College of Arts and Sciences peer advisor, pianist with Penn Chamber and co-president of Penn Taekwondo.

Her interest in inter-Korean conflict and the role of the U.S. in East Asia originates from a visit in 2011 to the De-Militarized Zone on the 38th parallel. In 2014, she participated in the Stanford Sejong Korean Scholars Program sponsored by the Freeman Spogli Institute, to further her knowledge on Korean culture, history and society. She wrote and was later selected to present at the 2014 Hana-Stanford Conference her research paper on challenges for the South Korean economy, hypothesizing that Confucian tradition, chaebols, military spending, the threat of China, and tense U.S.-China relations would prevent the ROK from achieving economic leadership. The following summer, she interned at the UN Global Compact Local Network Korea, where she learned about initiatives by Korean businesses to implement and promote corporate sustainability and UN principles.