CALL FOR CONFERENCE PROPOSALS

“Dynamic Korea in a Transforming Asia: Opportunities and Challenges for South Korean Development.”

April 18-19, 2013
Copenhagen Business School, Copenhagen, Denmark.


The Asia Research Centre (ARC) of the Department of Economics and Management at Copenhagen Business School is organizing a conference on contemporary Korea. The conference is co-sponsored by the Academy of Korean Studies in Seoul.

South Korea’s economic development trajectory is legendary. From a poor, impoverished, colonized, and war-ravaged economy, this small republic has rapidly transformed itself to a dynamic and prosperous one.
There are many reasons behind such a favorable development. These include early land reforms, education and infrastructure, an effective (albeit
authoritarian) state determined to effectively exploit its only resource (labor), through exports of labor-intensive goods, and an industrial compulsion driven by security concerns emanating from North Korea.
This has been furthered by an ongoing emphasis on industrial upgrading through learning by doing, research and development, and tertiary education.
Politically, South Korea has also matured, from the chaotic years in the 1950s to a more ordered, authoritarian government of the 1960s to the 1980s, to the relatively free-wheeling democratic society of today. Asia, too, has changed, first with rapid industrialization in Japan, the development of other high performing Asian economies such as Taiwan, Singapore, and Hong Kong accompanying Korean change, and now with the high-growth economies of China and India. This regional transformation is vast, deep, and globally unprecedented, so much so that the twenty-first century is said to belong to Asia.

The conference aims to capture capitalist Korea’s engagement with, and challenges from, contemporary Asia and thus engage leading Korea scholars, researchers, and policy makers from Korea, Asia, and the rest of the world. ARC is a leading institution in Asian Studies in the Scandinavian region, and is home to a number of political economists and business studies scholars who specialize on China, Japan, India, and South East Asia.
Given the specific mandate of ARC to promote the understanding of a dynamic Asian region in the twenty-first century, ARC is well positioned to undertake wide-ranging scholarly and strategic business and policy conversations with an international group of Korea scholars, to discuss and debate the changing relationship of Korea with a transforming Asia.

To understand Korea’s dynamism in the wider Asian context, we propose a discussion of “regional interaction and integration” (RII). Interaction refers to the on-going, dynamic relationships between Korea and other countries in Asia. The more intense the interaction, the greater is the degree of integration between the two parties. The task of this conference is to unravel and explain the growing interactions between Korea and the principal countries in Asia, either at a bilateral level or at a multilateral regional level.
Asia includes more narrowly the major economies of East Asia, South East Asia, and South Asia. (For greater manageability, we exclude West Asia and Oceania, acknowledging that they are important to South Korea.) We confine interaction and integration principally to four broad areas. These are a) region-based, geo-economic relationships, b) specific business, sectoral, and technological engagements with Asia, c) Korea’s responses to emergent challenges and opportunities associated with Korea’s ongoing engagement with the region, and d) Asia’s responses to Korean strategies and developments. This conference deliberately skirts the security-based international relations involving North Korea. Below we provide an indicative list of possible topics for further development and analysis under the rubric of “regional interaction and integration.” These themes will bring out Korea’s dynamism, its engagement with Asia, and Asian responses to Korea at bilateral or regional levels.
1) How is South Korea politically interacting with
a dynamic Asia in the twenty-first century? Given that the economic engine of the world economy has gravitated toward Asia, what are the geopolitical underpinnings of Korea’s gradual realignment with Asia? How does it view its political relationships with China, Japan, and India for example? Are there new strategic economic and business partnerships emerging with respect to Korea and what are the reasons for this development?

2) What are the economic, business, and technology
strategies of leading Korean firms in Asian countries, including but not limited to China, India, and Japan?
Given the increasing maturity of the Korean economy, how is the Korean economy restructuring itself and to what degree are Asian economies, bilaterally or regionally, contributing to this restructuring process?
For example, to what extent does Korea’s industrial upgrading involve the offshoring of manufacturing production to Asian countries? Are bilateral economic partnerships with Asian countries consistent with the regionalization of the Korean economy? Are there particular economic and industrial sectors in which Korean businesses are investing? What are the strategic implications on the Korean development trajectory for such investments? How are Korean businesses coping with new technological and investment competition from China, Japan, and others in Asian markets? In order to integrate more closely with Asia, is South Korea trying to attract investments, which goes against its own historical reluctance to rely on FDI?

3) What are the principal impediments to and
opportunities for the Korean economy and business to maintain strong ties to Asian economies? While economic growth in China and India and subsequent liberalization act to pull in Korean exports, investments, and technologies for both local markets and resource-seeking reasons, what are the implications on Korean employment at home? How do Korean businesses tackle foreign workers or for that matter cope with political opposition faced from tribal populations and NGOs to foreign investments as in the case of Pohang Iron and Steel Company’s (POSCO) intended investments in Indian mines and a large steel plant? How is Korea coping with its demographic transition? Is it preparing itself to integrate more deeply with Asian workers and high-skilled professionals by facilitating both temporary and permanent immigration? Is it internationalizing its education system with foreign students knowing well that Japan, its next-door neighbor, is in a state of crisis for its inability to interface adequately with the world economy? What is the nature of state-business strategy in tackling this emerging problem? How is it competing with Asian countries such as Japan and Taiwan in high technology sectors?

Given the multifaceted nature of the subject, we do not propose any particular methodology. In fact, we encourage interdisciplinary approaches, which are historically sensitive, raise interesting theoretical questions on the changing relationship between Korea and Asia, and are empirically rich. Those working on other Asian economies with strong Korea interests are particularly welcome to participate in the conference.
Participants will have advanced training as well as distinguished careers as political economists, sociologists, economists, economic geographers, political scientists, business and technology scholars, industry, labor, and regional specialists, and other related fields. We expect a good mix of senior, mid-career, and upcoming scholars from Korea, Asia, the US, and Europe.

Proposals, covering the following topics, have been
selected:
• Korean patents and technology competition in
Asia
• Environment and Korea’s new developmentalism
in Asia
• Indian responses to Korean investments
• Industrial relations of Korean businesses in
Asia
• Korea’s globalization in an Asian neoliberal
context
• Korea’s financial integration in the region
• Asian migrants in Korea
• Korea’s economic integration with Asia

We are looking for contributors who can complement the above themes in interesting ways, but also propose something novel about contemporary Korea and its relationships within Asia. Papers covering immigration from Asia to Korea, labor market shifts in Korea and their implications for Asia, science and technology policies and collaborations (or competition) with Asian countries, trade and patent conflicts, state-business partnership or economic nationalism in Korea and its impact on Asia, and Asian responses to Korean investments, exports, and labor management are especially welcome.

Those interested in participating must provide a title, 400-word abstract, and a one-page CV with a list of recent publications by October 15, 2013 to:

Anthony P. D’Costa, Conference Organizer Professor of Indian Studies and Research Director Asia Research Centre
E-mail: promothesdcosta@gmail.com and cc to "Lene Krarup Laursen" lkl.int@cbs.dk

If selected, complete papers are due March 25, 2013.
Overall fit with the conference, quality, and balance of topics will be the main criteria. The number of participants is limited due to budgetary constraints, regional representations, and balance of topics.
However, those selected will receive support for a round-trip economy class fare, excellent local lodging for two or three nights, and most meals. No other support is available.

The intended paper must be original, not previously published, and not under consideration anywhere else.
The Asia Research Centre at CBS will have the first right of rejection as an edited volume or a special issue of a journal will be published. For a recent example of a conference volume, see:

GLOBALIZATION AND ECONOMIC NATIONALISM IN ASIA
http://tinyurl.com/9lpxma2

Additional conference details will be posted as they become available, at:

www.cbs.dk/dkta

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Anthony P. D'Costa
Professor of Indian Studies and Research Director Asia Research Centre Copenhagen Business School Porcelænshavens 24B, 3.78
DK-2000 Frederiksberg, Denmark
Ph: +45 3815 2572

GLOBALIZATION AND ECONOMIC NATIONALISM IN ASIA
http://tinyurl.com/9lpxma2

A NEW INDIA?
http://www.anthempress.com/pdf/9780857285041.pdf

http://uk.cbs.dk/arc
http://www.thisismodernindia.com/this_is_modern_india_a
bout_us.html
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