The Politics of Family Policies in Korea

This article examines the development of Korea’s family policies, focusing on maternity and parental leave and childcare programs. In the face of socio-demographic challenges, Korea has expanded a wide range of public policies in order to assist female workers in balancing work and family life, and there have been important variations in the direction and specific tools of family policies over time, particularly in the context of government intervention and benefits and eligibility of family policies. In this article, I argue that the policy orientation of the small welfare state and the political partisanship of the government explain the political pathways of family policies in Korea during the 1990s and 2000s.