Preparing Korea for Global Competition in the 21st Century: An Agenda for Institutional Reform

The paper offers some thoughts on the institutional reforms that Korea will have to undertake to achieve sustained economic growth in the 21st century. It begins with the discussion of a key institution that contributed to Korea's rapid economic growth in the 1960s and 1970s and then argues that the demise of that institution in the later years has brought about an institutional hiatus with serious consequences to the economy. The paper then concludes that the globalizing world of the 21st century will require Korea to change many of its age-old informal institutions as they are incompatible with the formal institutions necessary for Korea to be competitive in the new world economy.