Contextualizing Accumulation by Dispossession: The State and High-Rise Apartment Clusters in Gangnam, Seoul

Abstract

In an effort to contribute to the contemporary debates on accumulation by dispossession (ABD), we argue for a closer attention to the link between the state and ABD. We propose contextualizing ABD within the institutionalization of the process of replacing communal property rights with private property rights. In such institutionalization, the state plays a critical role as the final guarantor of property rights. As such, the sociospatial specificities of the state would strongly influence how ABD unfolds and how it is understood. In the empirical part of this article, we use this approach to focus on a specific type of capitalist state—that is, the developmental state—to examine the emergence of apartment-dominated residential landscapes in Gangnam District, Seoul, in the 1970s through the use of ABD. Key Words: accumulation by dispossession and primitive accumulation of capital, developmental state, Gangnam District, high-rise apartments, Seoul, South Korea, vertical accumulation.

为了对掠夺式积累（ABD）的当前辩论做出贡献，我们主张应更密切关注国家与ABD之间的关联。我们提出在以私有产权取代公有产权的过程制度化中，对 ABD 进行脉络化。在此般制度化中，国家扮演了产权最终保证者的关键角色。如此，国家的社会空间特殊性，将会强烈影响 ABD 如何展现及其如何被理解。本文的经验部分中，我们运用此一取径，聚焦一种特定的资本主义国家类型——亦即发展型国家——检视1970 年代首尔江南区通过运用ABD所浮现的以公寓为支配性的住宅地景。关键词：掠夺性积累和资本原始积累，发展型国家，江南区，高层公寓，首尔，南韩，垂直积累。

En nuestro esfuerzo por contribuir a los debates actuales sobre acumulación por desposesión (ABD), abogamos por una mayor atención al vínculo existente entre el estado y la ABD. Nuestra propuesta es contextualizar la ABD dentro de la institucionalización del proceso de remplazar los derechos de la propiedad comunal con los derechos de la propiedad privada. En tal institucionalización, el estado juega un papel crítico como garante final de los derechos de propiedad. De por sí, las especificidades espaciales del estado influirían fuertemente el modo como la ABD se desdobla y cómo es entendida. En la parte empírica del artículo, usamos este enfoque para concentrarnos en un tipo específico de estado capitalista—esto es, el estado desarrollista—para examinar la aparición de los paisajes residenciales con predominio del apartamento como unidad residencial en el Distrito Gangnam, Seúl, durante los años 1970, por medio del uso de la ABD. Palabras clave: acumulación por desposesión y acumulación primitiva de capital, acumulación vertical, Corea del Sur, estado desarrollista, Distrito Gangnam, Seúl, torre de apartamentos.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Nik Heynen and the anonymous reviewers for their constructive critiques as well as audience members at various seminars and conferences where the arguments in this article were developed.

Funding

Both authors acknowledge support from the National Research Foundation of Korea Grant, funded by the Korean government (NRF-2017S1A3A2066514).

Notes

1 The word gangnam literally means “south of a river.” In South Korea, however, Gangnam conventionally refers to the three districts (gu in Korean administrative terms) within Seoul’s Gangnam: Gangnam-gu, Seocho-gu, and Songpa-gu. We use the conventional definition in this article and treat it as a proper noun.

2 This is not to suggest that we view the state in isolation: The state is to be interpreted from a strategic relational perspective (see Jessop 1990) that situates the state in shifting configurations of state–society relations. Understanding the process of building the nation state in shifting state–society and state–capital relations thus becomes paramount.

3 Taking this analytical framework, this article does not engage with the expanding geographical literature on the formation and reproduction of the developmental state. Geographers such as Glassman and Choi (2014), Hwang and Park (2014), and Park and Choi (2014) have shown that the developmental state is not a monolithic rational actor but a reflection of the vector sum of various forces that operate at local, national, and international scales. We agree with them, but we do not directly engage with that discussion in this article. For the purpose of this article, to discuss the connection between the state specificity and the ABD, we choose to look across policies cross-sectionally and attempt to find the pattern of ABD, thereby showing that the pattern reflects the nature of the state and not the complicated process in which those specificities of the state are formed.

4 The proportion of the number of dwelling units to the number of households in Seoul fell from 50.1 percent in 1966 to 45.7 percent in 1972.

5 Between 1963 and 1979, the average annual income quadrupled (The Bank of Korea 2011).

6 AURIC is short for Architecture & Urban Research Information Center, which provides archive services for articles on various architectural and urban themes published in South Korea.

7 Although clearly stated in the Act and subsequent government guidelines, compulsory purchase was exercised very rarely because companies feared that it could damage their reputations.

8 In return for such preferential treatment, certified firms were required to supply at least 1,000 housing units annually to help meet government targets for annual housing provision.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jung Won Sonn

JUNG WON SONN is Lecturer in Urban and Regional Economic Development at Bartlett School of Planning, University College London, London WC1H 0NN, UK. E-mail: [email protected]. He also teaches at KOICA-CAU Urban Policy Programme, a professional training programme for planners from developing world, funded by South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs. His research interests include state theory, national territorial planning in East Asia, and technological innovations and regional economic development.

Hyun Bang Shin

HYUN BANG SHIN is Professor of Geography and Urban Studies and the Director of Saw Swee Hock Southeast Asia Center at the London School of Economics and Political Science, London WC2A 2AE, UK. E-mail: [email protected]. He was also Eminent Scholar of Geography at Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea. His research centers on the critical analysis of the political economic dynamics of urbanization, the politics of redevelopment and displacement, gentrification, housing, the right to the city, and megaevents as urban spectacles, with particular attention to Asian cities.