The Development of Social Economy in South Korea: Focusing on the Role of the State and Civil Society

Abstract

The existing literature has claimed that the state-backed social enterprises in South Korea could be degenerated since the South Korean civil society is not advanced enough to safeguard them against the isomorphic pressure wielded simultaneously by the state and the market. Taking this claim seriously, this paper examines the recent development of social economy in South Korea. Based on the considerable changes in the long-standing statist model of nonprofit sector since the late 1990s, the enormous impact of 2011 FAC on the civil society and social economy, and more frequent collaborative effort between the local governments and civil society organizations since 2012, this paper claims that the development of social economy in South Korea has recently shifted from dominance of state power to a mixture of top-down and bottom-up approaches.

Keywords: capability of civil society, state-civil society partnership, social economy, cooperatives, institutional change