Introduction

South Korea’s history, strategic location, and political relations in the past and today, have created an economy which is one of the strongest in Southeast Asia. “According to the World Bank, in the last 30 years, South Korea’s economy is one of the most outstanding success stories in international development.” (Globaled, p.1). Dating from the Japanese occupation of South Korea , from 1910 thru 1946, then the division of the peninsula enforced by the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics after Japan’s unconditional surrender during WWII; the Republic of Korea (ROK) had gone throughout drastic changes in its social, economic, and political structure, but in the 1960s, under the regime of Park Chung Hee, the Korean government implemented measures to increase export and decrease the import of foreign goods and at the same time nationalized banks, and persecuted South Korean business leaders for profiting from the corruption in the South Korean government. During this period South Korea woke up to a dawn of industrial revolution that changed the economic future of the Peninsula. Park started what would take the ROK from a agricultural economy, to one of the world’s largest economies. Although the Japanese government had put in place some infrastructure to developed the Korean Peninsula during the Japanese occupation from 1890’s to 1945, these infrastructures were solely for Japan benefit. “Many economists think it developed into the world’s 11th largest economy by following the model of the world’s second largest economy just next door – Japan.” (Korea, 2001). Park’s administration developed and adapted the Japanese economic system they had introduced in South Korea since the 1920, the “Zaibatsu”. The Korean version is called “Chaebol” which means “business conglomerate”.
The Japanese Occupation