The purpose of this dissertation is to prove the followings; i) increasing economical interdependency is strategically useful for the Korean peninsula's peace settlement and also ii)that the war and dispute can be prevented as the economical interdepe...
The purpose of this dissertation is to prove the followings; i) increasing economical interdependency is strategically useful for the Korean peninsula's peace settlement and also ii)that the war and dispute can be prevented as the economical interdependency between the South and North Korea is increased through historical case study.
Scholars with liberal tendency who study international political science mostly agree with the idea that the economical interdependency will resolve the dispute and promote the peace settling process. The scholars insists that as the economical interdependency increases the cost of war or dispute, it decreases the possibility of dispute taking place. In addition, they argue that the economical interdependency promote the structuring of cooperation between countries hence contributed to the peace settlement.
Therefore, in this dissertation following two issues were analysed based on the recognition of the interdependency theory; i)how much the inter-Korean Economical Cooperation progressed for the past 20 years contributed to the increasing of the interdependency between the North and South Korea, and ii)how it's functions worked for the national security and prevention of dispute at the times of crisis in the nation.
As a result of analysis, since the economical cooperation between North and South Korea began in 1989, it showed growth. Especially, since the Government for the People which claimed the North Korea Embracing policy and Participatory Government began, the tendency in which the weight on the trade between the North and South drastically increasing showed. Of course, the economical dependency between the North and South shows much differences. In case of South Korea, the weight on the trade with North Korea which was merely 0.02% inflated to 0.2% which is about 10 times more on 2006 but on the other hand, 0.2% of North Korea's weight on the trade with South Korea increased to 45.1% which is as much as 225 times more. If the Government for the People can be evaluated as the time period with the focus on the quantity inflation of the North and South Korea Economical Cooperation, the Participatory Government's North and South Korea's policy can be evaluated as the time period with the focus on the quality inflation of the inter-Korean Economical Cooperation. In other words, as the participatory government began, the inter-Korean Economical Cooperation's commercial transaction such as regular trade or processing of brought-in materials trade is gradually increasing, whereas non-commercial trade is on the decreasing tendency hence, it can be deemed that the progress is made as the expanded improvements of trades between the industries and vertical industry's being separated.
When considering that deepening of unilateral dependent relation in the relationship of state economy may cause conflict, if only the quantity increase is being sought between North and South Korea, long-term development is hard to be achieved. Therefore the difference in the trade weight of the two Korea is implicating that the mutual supplementary economical structure as a foundation while balancing to certain extent and forming dependent economy relationship will become an important work in the future of inter-Korean Economic Cooperation.
Furthermore, whether the expansion of economical interdependency between two Korea was effective for the security issues was looked at through case analysis. For the crisis case, 2002 nuclear test of North Korea, 1999 and 2002 missile launch of North Korea were looked at as a whole in relation to the inter-Korea Economic Cooperation. As a result, despite the international concern, the war did not broke in the Korean Peninsula. Rather, after those incidents broke, the amount of trade between the two increased instead of the inter-Korea Economic Cooperation being on hold. This was because North Korea was put on an economical embargo from the international society and lacked greatly economically hence, their only source of foreign currency was South Korea. In other word, North Korea concluded that it would not be profitable to worsen the relationship with South Korea and lose welfare effect which may come from the economical cooperation. Accordingly it can be explained as some kind of security effect based on the economical dependency relationship.
Based on the above analysis result, it is recommended that the inter-Korea Economic Cooperation shall be progressed without being on hold in the government of next term in this dissertation. The reason why the government for the people and participatory government worked hard for the successful settlement of the inter-Korea Economic Cooperation despite the difficult environment is for the peace and prosperity of the Korean Peninsula and to become one country. Accordingly, it was suggested that the government of next term shall, for the revitalization of the inter-Korea Economic Cooperation, come up with active policy related to existence of national security act, maintenance of inter-Korea economic cooperation related laws, measures to collect financial resources for the modernization of industry infrastructures and small-mid size business entering North Korean market and such.
Since the division, for more than 50 years North and South Korea maintained opposition under the heterogenous political-economical structure. Therefore, only useful way to promote peace while difference structures coexists, is expansion of economical interdependency through inter-Korea Economic Cooperation. In other word, the expansion of economical cooperation between two Koreas can be viewed as a process of unification while deepening the economical dependency and securing ethnic identities.