Eun Mee Kim is Professor Emeritus, and the 17th President of Ewha Womans University (March 2021–January 2025). She is the first UN Women’s Goodwill Ambassador from the Republic of Korea (ROK). She is an Honorary Distinguished Professor of the University of Central Lancashire in the UK.

She received the PhD and MA in Sociology from Brown University, and BA in Sociology from Ewha Womans University. Before joining Ewha as a Professor in the Graduate School of International Studies, she was a Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Southern California. She is an expert on economic and political development of ROK and East Asia; UN and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); international development cooperation, and globalization. In addition to numerous academic publications, she is co-author of the UN Global Sustainable Development Report 2019, for which she was appointed by the UN Secretary General as one of 15 scientists in the world. She was the first ROK university recipient of a research grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (2013–2025) on global public health from the ROK.

She was the first woman to serve on the Samsung Electronics’ Board of Directors (2013–2016). She served as Vice-Chair of the Korean National Commission for UNESCO, and advisor to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, and Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA). She received the Republic of Korea’s Order of Service Merit – Highest Order Blue Stripes (2025) for her life-long service for higher education, and Service Merit Medal (2012) for her contributions to the Fourth High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan in 2011. She received the Chang-Lin Tien Distinguished Leadership Award from the Asia Foundation, and the Building Bridges Award from the Pacific Century Institute. She is a member of non-profit organizations (NPOs) including The Asia Foundation, Pacific Century Institute, and Do-Run-Do-Run, which is a ROK-based NPO working on gender empowerment through development cooperation in the Global South.