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The Strategy for Korea's Economic Success . By Hwy-chang Moon . New York : Oxford University Press , 2016. xviii, 304 pp. ISBN: 9780190228798 (cloth, also available as e-book).
Developmental Mindset: The Revival of Financial Activism in South Korea . By Elizabeth Thurbon . Ithaca, N.Y. : Cornell University Press , 2016. xii, 221 pp. ISBN: 9781501703102 (cloth, also available in paper and as e-book).
Book Reviews--Korea
South Korea has achieved remarkable economic success over the past five decades, but few cohesive models that explain its success comprehensively have been suggested. Korea's success was often understood as a copy or imitation of the Japanese development model and was often juxtaposed with the historical experiences of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Hwy-chang Moon's The Strategy for Korean's Economic Success and Elizabeth Thurbon's Developmental Mindset challenge such a tendency and try to capture a Korean model of economic development, based on Korea's unique institutional, political, and structural conditions. Both books make invaluable contributions to the field of Korean studies in general, and developmental studies in particular.
Moon raises a simple but critical question on Korea's economic development: "What are the real fundamental factors behind Korea's success?" (Moon, p. 241). He answers this question by highlighting four factors--agility, benchmarking, convergence, and dedication--dubbed as an "ABCD model." Moon breaks down these four factors into two subfactors each: "Agility must be based on speed and precision. Benchmarking must be pursued through learning the best practice. Convergence is created from mixing the right resources to maximize synergies. And lastly, dedication requires diligence with a clear goal-oriented mindset" (Moon, p. 93). He argues that Korea and Korean firms can achieve economic success by creatively designing constructive strategies based on these eight factors. This ABCD model looks simple, but it provides an accessible framework to grasp the key institutional features in the Korean economic development process.
But, can the model be replicated in other settings? Moon claims that the ABCD model can be used to enhance competitiveness in other economies or firms. For this purpose, he further articulates the model: "the first four subfactors--speed, learning, mixing, and diligence--constitute the 'basic' factors for enhancing competitiveness in the early developing stages, and the other four subfactors--precision,...