지방행정체제 개편에 관한 경로의존성 연구

Reorganization of Local Government System and Path Dependancy

This paper attempts to find out any path-dependence tendencies of local government system restructuring policies. The scope of analysis includes local government system change in three dimensions: (1) the vertical tier of governments; (2) the area (jurisdiction) of local administration; and (3) allocation of authority, tasks, and function among national government, sub-national governments. We found that there was a strong path-dependence tendencies in local government reorganization policies, like many other Korean public institutions. The path dependence has been coupled with self-reinforcing mechanism by institutional inertia and conservative key policy makers, even since 1995, a critical juncture, when the local autonomy system has been introduced. The Korean local government system has basically maintained two-tier system. The only exception is the Jeju (island) special province, and experienced the city-county consolidation without significant devolution to lower tiers of sub-national governments. Based on our findings, we hypothesize that any future reorganization efforts of local government system will also go through the path-dependence found earlier, unless there are punctual political and social changes, such as, constitutional revision or leadership transformation.