Limitations of the Social Welfare Reform during the Progressive Governments of South Korea: Theoretical Implications

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This study assesses the social welfare reform under the progressive
governments of South Korea (hereafter Korea) led by President
Kim Dae-jung (1998-2003) and President Roh Moo-hyun
(2003-2008), and considers its theoretical implications. The institutional
efforts of both the governments to expand the Korean
social welfare system did not produce the anticipated results.
Therefore, although the Korean economy has grown rapidly
along with a considerable increase in the national income per
capita in comparison with that in the past, the country’s social
welfare system still remains significantly backward in all
respects, relative to that of all the other OECD countries with
similar economic power, let alone the advanced welfare states in Western Europe. This study maintains that the key reason for
the inertia or status quo despite the significant efforts of both
the governments to expand social welfare is explained in the
Korean growth-first doctrine, which inherently considers that
distribution hinders growth and that social policy is secondary
to economic policy, thus limiting the choices of the country’s
decision makers, as has been the case all along since the developmental
period. Given that the growth-first doctrine inherently
regarded the relationship between growth and welfare as
mutually exclusive, it was perhaps certain that the influence of
the doctrine upon the social welfare policy of both the progressive
governments would not be so positive. This suggests that
path dependence is active in the case of the Korean social welfare
policy, thus substantiating the validity of path-dependence
theory.

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