Corporatism as a Crisis Response to Democratisation? Comparing the Rise and Fall of Corporatism in South Korea and South Africa

ABSTRACT

In South Africa and South Korea, the state adopted corporatism as a crisis response to the demands of democratisation. As a result, as social dialogue mechanisms, the corporatist institutions in South Africa and South Korea have failed to bring the actors together and to resolve the various issues as these institutions were expected to do. Labour in particular has been placed at a disadvantage in the overall policy-making process. Consequently, labour has become discontented, forcing it to withdraw from these processes. This article compares the rise and fall of corporatism in two seemingly very different cases, namely South Africa and South Korea by examining four similar reasons that prompted the adoption of corporatism and four similar conditions that also led to its collapse.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 The KTC changed its name to the Economic and Social Development Commission (ESDC) in 2007. The KTC used to have subcommittees and special committees; however, the ESDC now has one standing committee instead of these two. The restructuring was conducted in order to raise efficiency. In this paper, the KTC will be referred to as the corporatist institution in South Korea. Many people are still likely to refer to the corporatist framework as the KTC.

2 Schmitter (1974) provides a more detailed definition of corporatism by distinguishing between state corporatism and societal corporatism. The biggest difference is that state corporatism is regarded as having the characteristics of an authoritarian society, that is, the state creates interest organisations. Societal corporatism refers to corporatism where the participants have their own autonomy (Schmitter 1974, 102). Italy under the Fascist regime is a prominent example of state corporatism. The corporatism found in other Western European countries such as the Netherlands can be categorised as societal or liberal corporatism.

3 In South Africa, the RDP was the primary socio-economic development blueprint of the first democratic government but it only endured for two years. After democratisation in 1994, South Africa sought various tools to overcome socio-economic problems. South Africa initially emulated the developmental state model, attributed to Northeast Asian countries, including South Korea. Nattrass (1994, 347) notes that the ANC's economic policy during the early 1990s was largely influenced by the South Korean model, with state control over business, and a high level of state intervention.

4 Atypical workers are anyone not employed on a conventional permanent basis. Examples include temporary workers, contract workers, agency workers, seasonal workers, term time workers, casual workers and sessional workers among others (Shin and Kong 2014).

5 NEDLAC was established by the NEDLAC Act 35 of 1994 for the purpose of: (1) promoting the goals of economic growth, participation in economic decision-making and social equity; (2) reaching consensus and concluding agreements on matters pertaining to social and economic policy; (3) encouraging and promoting the formulation of co-ordinated policy on social and economic matters; (4) considering all proposed labour legislation relating to labour market policy before it is introduced in Parliament; and (5) considering all significant changes to social and economic policy before they are implemented or introduced in Parliament (NEDLAC 2012).

6 The DLP was founded in January 2000, in an effort to create a political wing for the KCTU and was considered more left-wing and more independent of the two union federations in South Korea. In December 2011, the party merged into the Unified Progressive Party.

7 In South Korea, ideology, the strong anti-Communist stance due to the confrontation with North Korea, played an important role in terms of the incorporation of labour. Under the Conservative Party, the state suspected labour movements of being linked to North Korea and planning to cause social disorder (Guillen 2000). Also, labour has always been suspicious of ‘state-business collusion’ (Kong 2000).

8 According to CDE (1999, 48), NEDLAC's influence is confined to the first stages of ‘initiatives, investigation, expert proposals, cabinet approval of green papers, public comment, drafts of the official position, cabinet approval and consideration at NEDLAC’ in the government's policy-making process. However, after these procedures, NEDLAC has no impact on, ‘state law adviser processes, Parliament portfolio committees, Parliament, departmental stages (preparation for implementation) and promulgation’.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Seed Program for Korean Studies through the Ministry of Education of Republic of Korea and Korean Studies Promotion Service of The Academy of Korean Studies [grant number AKS-2016-INC-2230007].