Could you briefly introduce yourself and Palgrave Macmillan?

– Hi, I am Farideh Koohi-Kamali. I am the Publisher for the Global Outreach Program, which is a new initiative at Palgrave Macmillan. Palgrave Macmillan is an academic global publisher. We publish books in social sciences, humanities, economics, finance, business, and management. Our major audiences are academic communities, and all of our books are peer reviewed. I have been with Palgrave Macmillan for over 12 years and in different positions.

– At the moment, I am travelling in Asia for this new initiative that we have called “Global Outreach.” The idea is to come and talk with professors and research institutes like the Asan Institute for Policy Studies, to seek new opportunities to start new partnerships with them for publishing their research.

How did you begin working with Asan Institute publications?

– I met one of the representatives of the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in one of the Asia studies conference in North America. We immediately connected and understood what we were looking for and what we wanted and that became a relationship that has continued for almost two years.

How do you consider the Asan Institute for Policy Studies as a partner?

– The partnership with the Asan Institute is very unique for us and a very important partnership because the research that comes out of Asan are very professional, very serious, very much the standard that we are looking for. The Asan Institute gives us their projects and we publish them and offer the global marketing reach to Asan. So it is a relationship that benefits both directions.

Could you introduce the Asan-Palgrave collections?

– The first books we published cover broad topics like the Japan crisis, China’s foreign policy, the Arab Spring, and we were very pleased to publish those.

– We also publish other projects that are more specific and more theory oriented. We will soon be publishing the “Palgrave Pivot” series of Asan reports of 25,000-35,000 words.

What is the feedback on Asan Institute books?

– The feedback is fantastic, because when the Asan Institute gives us books, they are of very good quality and meet a high standard. That has always been impressive for people because scholars look for good quality and high standard scholarship, and Asan offers that.

Dr. Hahm often says, “We try to carry the voice of Asia.” In that respect, how do you think that the Asan Institute fulfills that role?

– The Asan Institute for Policy studies is very professional and has high standards. High quality and high standards are very important for me. I use the Asan Institute for Policy Studies as an example when I talk to other researchers and institutions and see it as an example for copy editing, language, style, content, and copyright issues.

Concluding Remarks

– This is a relationship that I hope will flourish even more, and I look forward to our continued relationship. In about another year, we might have well over 15 titles with the Asan Institute and that is very promising for this happy relationship.