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The Characteristics and Policy Implications of Territorial Structure Changes in Korea
정주공간의 구조적 변화와 대응방향(RR 2003-1)
Chang-Hyun Kim, Yang-Ho Park, and In-Kwon Park December 2003․266 pages․Korean
This study aims to understand the structural changes of human settlements in Korea and suggest some policy implications for balanced regional development. For these purposes, it reveals the urbanization of human settlements, expansion of living space, patterns of migration, interregional interaction, and changes in population structure.
This study is composed of 8 chapters, which can be categorized into three main parts such as theoretical review, analysis of the realities, and policy implications.
The results of theoretical review are summarized as follows. The related theories represent that as a society is developed from early industrial society to higher post-industrial society via industrial society, some metropolises dominate the human settlements system and then form metropolitan areas. Accordingly, people migrate from rural areas to cities at the first phase, from small cities to large cities at the second phase, and then from large cities to the surrounding areas at the last phase. In that process, large cities' economies are reorganized into higher service sector oriented economies and their surrounding small -and medium- sized cities focus on the production function. Along with that phenomenon, young and well-educated people gather in large cities, while simple technical workers gather in small and medium cities and old and ill-educated people remain in rural areas.
Moving on to the analysis of the realities, it deals with the trends of urbanization and changes of population distribution, interregional comparison of migration, interregional linkage, and interregional comparison of the population structure. The main results show the following.
Firstly, Korea's urbanization is entering the final stage through the 1990s, and the urbanization rate is 84.5% as of 2000. Along with that trend, the primacy of the capital
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city, Seoul, is weakening within the system of cities in terms of population distribution.
It is due to the growth of the cities such as Incheon, Suwon, and some new-town areas surrounding Seoul within the Seoul Metropolitan Area (SMA).
Secondly, the migration of the Korean people in the 1990s is characterized by the fact that migration of rural population into urban areas is slowed down while inter-city migration increases, particularly from large cities to small and medium cities.
Regionally, the concentration of population in the SMA is still sustaining and population moving into the Chungcheong Area is on the rise. In the meantime the population of the Gyeongsang Area, the second largest area is moving out rapidly, which means that the base of human settlements in the non-capital regions is rapidly decaying.
Thirdly, the cause of migration has been changing with time. In the past, the main reason of migration was related to economic factors as people usually moved from rural areas to urban areas. But housing, education and living environment are emerging as main factors of migration as the pattern of migration is changed into inter-city migration in the 1990s. Comparing the structure of population among regions, there are drastic differences in terms of educational and occupational status and age of residents. As mainstay management functions and high level service functions are concentrating on the SMA with manufacturing functions moving out of that area, well-educated and high-skilled young people are concentrating upon the SMA while ill-educated old people are moving into the non-capital regions. It means that the spatial division of occupational structure is accelerating and dependency of the non-capital regions on the SMA is deepening.
Fourthly, examining the interregional linkages through regional interaction, we can ascertain again that metropolitan areas are expanding by embracing the surrounding areas and the Korean national territory is being reorganized into human settlements that some metropolitan areas dominate. In particular, the influence of the SMA is expanding through the Chungcheong and Gangwon Areas to some parts of the Jeolla and Gyeongsang Areas. Of course, it is true that there exist some regional disparities. In the case of the SMA and the South Gyeongsang Area, the central metropolises and the surrounding cities are well developed and systematic and hierarchical linkages among
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cities are also well formed. However, it is not same with the cases of the Chungcheong and Jeolla Areas.
Fifthly, in the process of urbanization many people, in particular young people have rushed to urban areas from rural areas and the Korean rural areas have been experiencing severe reduction of population and aging phenomenon. Examining the education level, the percentage of ill-educated people is still high while overall education level is on the rise throughout the nation. Analyzing the structure of employment and occupation, the post-industrialization is proceeding in the SMA while manufacturing sector is still overwhelming in other cities. In the meantime wholesale and retail trade, the restaurant and lodging industries are relatively increasing in rural areas. It is notable that large non-capital cities are still oriented toward manufacturing rather than management and specialized office occupation while the ratio of mainstay occupations is very high in the medium-sized cities surrounding Seoul. It means that even large non-capital cities are dependent upon the SMA in functional aspects.
Finally going into policy implications; if we do not cope with social changes such as the opening of the Korea Train Express (KTX), a Korean bullet train, information development and increase of leisure time, the SMA is supposed to dominate the national territory of human settlements. That is to say, the migration into the SMA may continue and the influence of the SMA can expand throughout the country.
Considering the industrial functions regionally, mainstay managerial functions and high level services tend to concentrate on the SMA while production functions extend to the non-capital regions. According to such a spatial division of function and occupation, well-educated and high-skilled young people will flow into the SMA.
In order to counteract the gloomy prospects of human settlements and achieve balanced regional development in this country, we should reinforce the independency of human settlement system in the non-capital regions. For this goal, we should expand mainstay management and high-level services in large non-capital cities, develop small cities specialized in specific functions, pursue integrated and collaborative development of cities and the rural hinterland, and induce well-educated young people to turn back to the non-capital regions. In addition we should bring up new industries for senior workers and establish welfare system such as geriatrics hospitals in order to cope with an aged society.
