Unification of Germany in 1990 has caused the keen interest in the unification costs, leading to extensive studies of estimating the unification costs of the Korean peninsula. Researchers, however, realized that estimating the unification costs withou...
Unification of Germany in 1990 has caused the keen interest in the unification costs, leading to extensive studies of estimating the unification costs of the Korean peninsula. Researchers, however, realized that estimating the unification costs without considering the unification benefits would overestimate the costs. Consequently, they have adopted a new methodology to estimate the unification costs along with the unification benefits. Recent researches have shown the vision of unified Korea with figures of GDP and national power, and methodological framework to estimate the unification effect has been established.
This research draws a model evaluating the unification effect, based on the existing researches related to the unification costs and benefits, by utilizing statistics such as GDP, GNI per capita and World Power Index. By applying this model to the cases of unification of Germany, Vietnam and Yemen, it is possible to evaluate each country's unification effect. To find out the reason why each country produces a different unification effect, this research examines the relation between the governing system and the unification effect.
Through this process, this research confirms the unification effect of Germany as 'self-esteem', that of Vietnam during the unification process period (1976-1996) as 'practical' and that of Vietnam during the normal state period (1997-2014) as 'progressive', and that of Yemen as 'regressive'. In terms of governing system during the unification period, Germany's governing system is identified as state-centric governance, that of Vietnam as mixture of dictatorial and bureaucratic governing system during the unification process period whereas as mixture of bureaucratic governing and state-centric governance during the normal state period, and that of Yemen as dictatorial governing system. Finally, it is concluded that the unification effect has been strongly influenced by the governing system, and the relation between the governing system and the unification effect is identical to the relation between the governance input/output and the result of economic growth & social welfare as shown in the table.
【Table】 A Comparison of the Relation between Governing System and Unification Effect with the Governance Input/Output Model
* NP : National Power, Eco: Economic effect, Non-Eco: Non-Economic effect
According to the type classification of the unification effect suggested in this research, it might be interpreted that Vietnam's unification effect is more favorable than Germany's in that Vietnam's unification effect during the normal state period is classified as progressive, while Germany's is classified as self-esteem. However, it should be understood that such difference mainly comes from huge gaps in the ultimate goal of unification, economic sizes, and national status in the world between the two countries.
Followings are the important findings of this research about the unification effect; First, types of governing system during the unification period would affect the unification effect, and the leadership of the unified government is the crucial factor in formulating the governing system. And if the unified government leads the country based on understanding of the governance, it would be expected to produce a beneficial unification effect.
Second, there are two types of unification costs; one is the planned unification costs, with which the developed side supports the underdeveloped side to reduce the gap of living standard and expedite the economic development. Such type of unification costs could produce the unification benefits in process of time and therefore would be treated as investment in the long term. The other is haphazard unification costs which have to be paid to cope with the unexpected situation without any plan in advance. This type of unification costs could become a sunk cost that can barely produce any unification benefits.
Third, the unification benefits would be produced by spending the planned unification costs or could be obtained from the unification itself, if achieved by overcoming a serious confrontation or ending a warfighting, because no more expense would be required for the confrontation or warfighting.
Fourth, it is also confirmed that the reasonable length of the unification process period, starting from the division dissolving stage to the nation building stage, is about 20 years and it is not recommended to last more than 25 years for the unification process period even allowing for the implementation trial and error.