The Free Trade Zone (FTZ) system, launched in 2003, is a spatial response strategy to regional changes in East Asia, such as the expansion of the global economic order and the reform-open policy of China. Incheon Free Trade Zone (IFEZ), which is a for...
The Free Trade Zone (FTZ) system, launched in 2003, is a spatial response strategy to regional changes in East Asia, such as the expansion of the global economic order and the reform-open policy of China. Incheon Free Trade Zone (IFEZ), which is a form of FTZ, is understood to be the product of national state’s plan to transform the neo-liberalistic economic system and overcome the advanced producer services(APS) based on attracting foreign investment companies. However, the analysis of the mega- project established upon the national state limits the depth of one’s understanding of the various roles of the private sectors. In addition, major cities connected to the global economic network simultaneously merged and fostered the surrounding areas, while internally, they expanded spatially and transformed into global city-regions by complementarity networks. Therefore, the IFEZ's 'International City' should also be defined within the scope of the global urban area and growth should be confirmed.
Fabricating upon such background, the study analyzed the aspects of governance revealed in the development of mega-projects, which in turn revealed the need for governance that encompasses a wider range of stakeholders in the regionalized city-region. Moreover, the analysis further extended into the exploration of the process of strengthening the connectivity of the global city network through the mega-project. Literatures, interviews and statistical data were analyzed to identify the changes of developmental processes and industrial structures from Incheon Metropolitan City’s 1990s Songdo New Town development plan to the current IFEZ.
The study revealed the following two conclusions. First, the development of the 'Global Special Zone' using the institutional and financial support of the national state and the capital of private investors was diverted from the primary goal due to disagreements and conflicts between the stakeholders. Urban development through the attraction of the private developers became largely infeasible due to the prosperity and adversity of the private collaborators, and the differences in revenue models among the public and private collaborators. The disagreements on method of project progression, incapability, and desertion of the developers further intensified the complication. The national state's planning agenda was not limited to the new Songdo City and IFEZ spatially, and local governments in the Seoul Metropolitan Area (SMA) incorporated their respective development plans into the national agenda. As SMA transformed into a polycentric spatial structure, IFEZ was functionally competitive with several newly formed clusters in SMA. Furthermore, as the national state’s public plan shifted from regional development to improvement of financial system, especially by abolishment of financial legislation, the importance of regional development oriented FTZ was diluted and the mega-project extended from IFEZ to SMA.
Second, the local government of Incheon sought to grow into global city and be involved in the global city network by fostering the APS through the development of Songdo New Town and IFEZ. The Songdo New Town development strategy of the local government of Incheon was designed as an alternative to enhance ‘City’s competitiveness’ within the external background of strengthening the national state’s development regulations to ease the population density of SMA and internal factor of city’s growth retard. The local government of Incheon diverged from its original indicator, which was ‘resident population’, and reforming its industrial structure by utilizing the international airports, rediscovering the existing marine transports, and fostering the information industry in 1990s. The Songdo New Town and IFEZ development plan were designed in the form of a global city, which emphasized the development of APS, such as information and communication, financial business, R&D, and logistics. Through this development, the local government of Incheon aspired to play the primary role in the Global economic order. However, as SMA changed to a polycentric global city-region, IFEZ was transformed into a complementary cluster within the global city-region from its form of directly accessing the global city network. The expected growth of APS and financial business from the Tri-port strategy to advance into global city failed in IFEZ. On the other hand, IFEZ grew into a large logistics hub based on international airports with intensive support at the national level, integrating logistics-related services, and forming a bio-cluster through the attraction of large and government projects in the bio-healthcare sector.
The study revealed the following implications. First, the series of development flows from Songdo New Town to IFEZ is still essential as a corporate-oriented development plan for industrial structure change in Korea's conditions, where housing site project and housing supply-oriented urban planning are valid. Today, this implication is further emphasized as the city’s competitiveness is deeply interconnected to the city’s economic power, which is evidently displayed by the development plans for corporate location and industrial development being preferred than housing development in Paju, Magok, Jamsil, and Pyeongtaek.
Second, nevertheless, the development of Songdo New Town-IFEZ still shows that there is a clear limit to independently conducting large-scale urban development under the political, institutional and financial conditions of local governments in Korea. IFEZ set a goal of competing with foreign SEZs on a global scale, but the actual competition arose with the clusters of ‘fragmented IFEZs’ in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province, and some sectors of mega-projects decelerated due to the lack of market choice despite public planning support. This is based on the evidence that older development method, such as moving of local agencies or construction of new towns established upon the relocation of public agencies within the inadequate provincial cities, is more limited in terms of attracting population and associated industries. Third, in order to maximize the effectiveness of urban development of local governments and to convert overlapping and competitive relations into complementary relationships, multi-level governance involving local governments and national state is necessary. The lack of governance among local governments in the regional scale that encompasses the national state to mediate and coordinate them has made the relationship between clusters in city region a more competitive zero-sum game than complementary. Since it is evident that city boundaries cannot embrace economic scope, the method of special zones planning through large-scale mega projects should be derived from global city region governance. Therefore, governance constituted local and regional governments, and ministries of national state, which leads into city-region is inevitable.