[기획연구] 이례적인 현상으로서의 KEDO

KEDO as an Anomaly: An Institutional Approach to Nonproliferation

The main objectives of this article are as follows: first, it argues that KEDO is a unique approach to preventing nuclear proliferation. Second, it demonstrates that KEDO is a semi-institutionalized multilateral security organization in Northeast Asia. Third, it examines whether KEDO has been successful in fulfilling its objectives of freezing and eventually dismantling North Korea's nuclear weapons program, stopping North Korea from withdrawing from the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and inducing North Korea to comply with IAEA safeguards. Finally, it tests whether KEDO can be replicated in other cases of nuclear proliferation. In other words, can it serve as a model in other regions? The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) is an anomaly. It is an anomaly not only from a U.S. global nonproliferation approach perspective, but also as an international organization. Why did the US. nonproliferation approach to North Korea not result in sanctions as in the cases of India and Pakistan, or in war as in the case of Iraq? Why did U.S. efforts to curb North Korea's nuclear ambitions lead to a multilateral solution unlike the nuclear cases of Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus that were settled on a bilateral basis? What is KEDOs organizational character? Is KEDO an international financial consortium as characterized in the Geneva Agreed Framework, a technical/energy organization or a security institution? Finally, contrary to common wisdom that there is no “structured” or “principled”multilateral security organization in Northeast Asia, this article will argue that KEDO has served as a semi-institutionalized multilateral security organization in the Northeast Asian region. With the advent of the second nuclear situation in North Korea, KEDO currently stands at the crossroads of either suspending or terminating its project altogether.Since the end of the Cold War, the emergence of second-generation proliferators has become one of the major threats to international peace and stability. In general, U.S.-led international responses to proliferation have been based on the threat or the actual use of force. If the United States opted to forego the use of force and settle the problem peacefully, the settlement usually resulted in the form of a bilateral solution. Despite the growing number of new-generation proliferators, KEDO marks the first case in which multilateral efforts have been organized to deal with a specific nuclear proliferation problem on the demand side. It is the first multilateral organization whose mission is to deliver inducements to the proliferating state, North Korea. This article, therefore, examines U.S. nonproliferation responses to Iraq, India, Pakistan, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus to demonstrate the uniqueness of KEDO. It will also test whether KEDO can be replicated in South Asia where there has been a clear lack of an organized nonproliferation response. This article will argue that nonproliferation efforts in the case of North Korea led to the creation of KEDO because of the following causal factors: the security environment surrounding the region, as well as the Korean peninsula, U.S. policies towards North Korea, and the characteristics of the North Korean regime. The strategic environment as well as U.S. policies towards North Korea made multi-level diplomacy inevitable in the context of the North Korean nuclear problem. These are the causal factors that led to the unique nonproliferation response of KEDO. Because of the unique security environment surrounding the Korean peninsula and South-North Korean relations, “multi-level diplomacy” is unavoidable for settling such major issues as nuclear nonproliferation. Multi-level diplomacy is a complicated process of “two-level games” of diplomacy and domestic politics, involving multiple players on the state, bureaucratic, and individual levels, as well as involving international organizations. Multi-level diplomac