Summary
As the locus of Great Power rivalry in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the battleground for the first ‘hot’ conflict of the early Cold War, and—in the case of the contemporary challenge of a nuclear North Korea—one of the most potentially destabilizing threats to regional security, the Korean peninsula is critical in understanding the history, politics, and international relations of Asia. However, Korea’s importance is not confined to issues of security and international conflict. The dramatic growth of South Korea, propelling it from the status of an underdeveloped and war-ravaged country to the world’s eleventh largest economy in the space of some thirty years, has been the subject of intense scrutiny by economists, political scientists, and sociologists. Understanding its rapid economic growth is important not only in assessing the nature of modern capitalism, but also in realizing the lessons of development that potentially can be applied to the economic challenges and opportunities faced by the developing world.