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Abstract
Lee Y.-S. Balanced development in globalizing regional development? Unpacking the new regional policy of South Korea, Regional Studies. This paper critically examines South Korea's adoption of ‘new regionalism’ as a basis for its regional policy initiatives. It is argued that this new regional policy poses dualism between endogenism and exogenism, and as such fails to reformulate and re-articulate theoretical and policy views on the globalization of regional development. Instead of dualism, a concept of ‘multi-scalar governance’ has been developed as an analytical lens through which regional development in the era of globalization can be analysed. Based on this viewpoint, the drawbacks of the new regional policy – the problems of triangular inter-scalar coordination – are specifically reviewed. For this analysis, archival re-examination and in-depth interviews with policy-makers have been employed.
Lee Y.-S. Le développement équilibré dans la mondialisation de l'aménagement du territoire? Déballer la nouvelle politique régionale de la Corée du Sud, Regional Studies. Cet article cherche à examiner d'un oeil critique l'adoption par la Corée du Sud de la ‘nouvelle régionalisation’ comme cadre des actions de sa nouvelle politique régionale. Dans cet article, on affirme que cette nouvelle politique régionale présente le dualisme entre des approches endogène et exogène et, par la suite, ne réussit ni à reformuler, ni à réarticuler des perspectives théoriques et de politique sur la mondialisation de l'aménagement du territoire. A la place du dualisme, on développe la notion de ‘gouvernance à échelles multiples’ comme une lentille analytique par laquelle on pourrait analyser l'aménagement du territoire à l'époque de la mondialisation. Dans cette optique, on fait la critique en particulier des inconvénients de la nouvelle politique régionale – à savoir, les problèmes de la coordination triangulaire à échelles multiples. Dans cette analyse, on réexamine des archives et interviewe dans le détail les décideurs.
Gouvernance à échelles multiples Politique régionale Aménagement du territoire Coordination à échelles mutiples Réseaux de production mondiaux Nouvelle régionalisation
Lee Y.-S. Ausgeglichene Entwicklung bei der Globalisierung der Regionalentwicklung? Eine Untersuchung der neuen Regionalpolitik in Südkorea, Regional Studies. In diesem Artikel wird die Übernahme des ‘neuen Regionalismus’ in Südkorea als Grundlage für regionalpolitische Initiativen kritisch untersucht. Ich argumentiere in meinem Beitrag, dass diese neue Regionalpolitik einen Dualismus zwischen Endogenismus und Exogenismus verursacht und somit nicht in der Lage ist, die theoretischen und politischen Perspektiven der Globalisierung der Regionalentwicklung neu zu formulieren und zu artikulieren. Anstelle eines Dualismus habe ich ein Konzept der ‘multiskalaren Regierungsführung’ als analytisches Objektiv entwickelt, durch das sich die Regionalentwicklung im Zeitalter der Globalisierung analysieren lässt. Ausgehend von dieser Perspektive werden die Nachteile der neuen Regionalpolitik – die Probleme der triangulären, interskalaren Koordination – spezifisch überprüft. Für diese Analyse haben ich Archive neu untersucht und Tiefeninterviews mit politischen Entscheidungsträgern geführt.
Multiskalare Regierungsführung Regionalpolitik Regionalentwicklung Interskalare Koordination Globale Produktionsnetze Neuer Regionalismus
Lee Y.-S. ¿Desarrollo equilibrado en la globalización del desarrollo regional? Análisis de la nueva política regional en Corea del Sur, Regional Studies. En este artículo analizo desde un punto de vista crítico la adopción del ‘nuevo regionalismo’ por parte de Corea del Sur como base para las iniciativas políticas a nivel regional. Sostengo que esta nueva política regional plantea un dualismo entre endogenismo y exogenismo y, por tanto, no puede reformular y rearticular perspectivas teóricas y políticas sobre la globalización del desarrollo regional. En vez de dualismo, he desarrollado un concepto de ‘gobernanza multiescalar’ como objetivo analítico a través del cual puede analizarse el desarrollo regional en la era de la globalización. Desde este punto de vista, reviso en concreto los inconvenientes de la nueva política regional: los problemas de la coordinación interescalar. Para este análisis he llevado a cabo una nueva investigación de archivo y entrevistas exhaustivas con responsables políticos.
Gobernanza multiescalar Política regional Desarrollo regional Coordinación interescalar Redes de producción global Nuevo regionalismo
Acknowledgements
This study was supported by the National University of Singapore Academic Research Fund (Grant No. R-109-000-061-112/133). The author would like to thank three anonymous referees for their constructive feedback on earlier drafts of this paper. The figures were prepared by Li Kheng Lee, Department of Geography, National University of Singapore.
Notes
Inward FDI and foreign TNCs are a relatively recent phenomenon in South Korea. Until recently, South Korea maintained a restrictive policy towards foreign investors in order to promote and protect indigenous domestic industries and firms. However, the government of Kim Young-Sam (1992–97) began to deregulate foreign investment restrictions policies due to internal and external pressure for the internationalization of the economy. Since the 1997 Asian financial crisis, South Korea has strongly highlighted inward FDI as the focus for macro-economic policy to overcome the foreign exchange crisis, advance the development of industry, and create further employment. The Korea Investment Service Center (KISC) was established within the Korea Trade Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA) in 1997 to attract investors (Turner and Kim, Citation2004).
In a similar context, ‘new regionalism’ was criticized because of its normative bias towards the region as the prime focus of economic policy, which reinforces the myths of endogenous development (Lovering, Citation1999; Markusen, Citation1999a). From a different angle, the obsessive focus of new regionalism on informational or knowledge-based economies was also criticized as merely neo-liberal rhetoric (Lovering, Citation1999, Citation2003).
Marks Citation(1992) first used the concept ‘multilevel governance’ to describe developments in European Union structural policy. Subsequently, it has been widely seen as explaining the new sets of rules and steering mechanisms adopted by the European Union. As the concept became more widely applied in a variety of policy areas by many scholars, it lost conceptual clarity. To identify common understandings of the concept, Bache and Flinders (Citation2004, p. 197) suggested four common strands of the concept.
The distinction between Type I and Type II developed by Marks and Hooghe Citation(2004) is helpful in highlighting the different qualities of various types of multilevel governance.
Power is defined here as the capacity to influence, which is realized through the process of exercising this influence.
Rather than positing the replacement of the national state by sub-national actors, Jessop Citation(2004) argued for the enhanced role of national states in managing inter-scalar relations. According to Jessop, national states seek to control what powers or competencies go up, down, or sideways, and to exercise this control so as to enhance their capacities to realize their current state projects. Thus, in Jessop's framework, the states still retain considerable autonomy in regard to organizing and rescaling state powers to promote state projects.
Restrictions were imposed on new construction and the expansion of factories, shops, universities and other facilities, which could potentially attract a large number of immigrants to the Seoul Metropolitan Area (Kim and Gallent, Citation1998).
The tenets of President Roh's participatory government are four-fold: principles and trust; fairness and transparency; dialogue and compromise; and the decentralization of power and autonomy (Korea Times, Citation2004a).
The government identified the previous unbalanced growth strategy as problematic, which had caused serious problems such as social and regional disparities, and met with critical failure in creating a new growth engine in the era of globalization (Korea Herald, Citation2004).
The Committee was established based on Presidential Order 17957.
These are the Ministry of Finance and Economy; the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development; the Ministry of Science and Technology; the Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs; the Ministry of Culture and Tourism; the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry; the Ministry of Commerce, Industry, and Energy; the Ministry of Information and Communication; the Ministry of Environment; the Ministry of Construction and Transportation; the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries; and the Ministry of Planning and Budget.
This signifies the increasing role of the non-state actors in policy design and implementation.
The councils were set up in Seoul, Busan, Daegu-Gyongbuk, Incheon, Gwangju-Jeonam, Daejeon, Ulsan, Gyonggi, Gwangwon, Chungbuk, Chungnam, Jeonbuk, Gyongnam, and Jeju.
The New Capital Region Development Plan faced increasing opposition as the government took steps to implement it. Seoul Mayor Lee Myung-bak spearheaded the anti-relocation campaign with Gyonggi province Governor Sohn Hak-kyu joining in. They took action against removing the city's function as an administrative capital and demanded a public vote (Korea Times, Citation2004b). Finally, the decision from the Constitutional Court nullified the New Capital Region Development Plan (Korea Times, Citation2005).
As of 2002, 83.6% of central government agencies, 75.5% of government-funded research institutes, and 83.2% of public enterprise headquarters are concentrated in the Seoul Metropolitan Area (Kwon, Citation2005).
Interview with a Research Fellow at Gyeonggi Research Institute, 21 December 2006.
Interview with a Research Fellow at Gyeonggi Research Institute, 21 December 2006.
Interview with a Director at Daejeon Bioventure Town, 29 December 2006.
Interview with an Assistant Director in Bio & Nano Tech Industries Division, MOCIE, 20 November 2006.
Interview with a Director and a Deputy Director in Fundamental Tech Division, MOST, 12 December 2006.
The state's aim at developing a North Asian business hub shows that the state pursued regionalization rather than globalization at the outset.
The Presidential Committee on Northeast Asian Business Hub (PCNABH) was also involved in the FEZ creation project and had a vision for the creation of ‘sticky places’. This idea, however, did not materialize in the FEZ project due to strong resistance from neo-liberal reformers in the MOFE, which strongly emphasized the urgency of developing financial centres in the Incheon FEZ (Park, Citation2005).
In the original plan for the ‘Northeast Asian Business Hub’, only Incheon was considered a possible location for FEZ. This original plan, however, was harshly criticized for its locational preference in the Seoul Metropolitan Area. As protests from the non-capital regions were growing, the state designated two more FEZs in Busan and Gwangyang (Park, Citation2005). Thus, the role of the FEZs in Busan and Gwangyang was confined as ports for logistics.
Jessop Citation(2004) already pointed out that work on multilevel governance remains at a pre-theoretical state. Jessop also critiqued multilevel governance as it tends to neglect problems of governance failure due to its excessive emphasis on problem-solving and crisis management. Peters and Pierre (Citation2004, p. 76) are also critical of multilevel governance since ‘it lacks both a clear conceptual analysis as well as a critical discussion of multilevel governance as a democratic process’.
