Post-war economic recovery policy: experience of the Republic of Korea

Abstract

The development of a strategy for post-war recovery of Ukraine's economy determines the advisability and importance of taking into account international experience. An urgent task is to assess the possibility to implement those economic policy tools that have proven their practical effectiveness. At the same time, it is necessary to define the reservations and risks associated with the implementation of certain aspects in the recovery policy. The purpose of the article is to identify institutional factors and economic mechanisms that provided the successful post-war recovery and development of the Republic of Korea in the 1960s and 1970s. Revealing the positive experience of the restructuring involves the account of historical conditions, and the role of foreign aid and internal sources of economic growth. The author has used the methods of comparative and problem-logical analysis, the institutional-evolutionary approach, the principle of integrability as a basis for the synthesis of empirical and theoretical knowledge, and the methodological approach of F. List regarding the historical conditioning of forms of economic nationalism. It is established that after the end of the Korean War, in 1953–1960, domestic policy and foreign aid were focused on solving the primary tasks of overcoming devastation and hunger. The author considers the forms of interaction between the state, the business environment and foreign aid in ensuring the recovery and development of the economy of the Republic of Korea in the 1960s and 1970s. Contrary to the recommendations aimed at liberalizing the economy with a focus on the development of traditional industries, the government of Park Chung-hee gradually implemented a national strategy aimed at industrialization and achieving global competitiveness on high-tech markets. This was facilitated by the introduction of the national planning system, the financial strategy of public-private partnership, and the support for export-oriented industrial production. The agrarian reform, focused on the development of highly productive family farming, contributed to the consolidation of food self-sufficiency and expansion of the domestic market. The strict policy of the redistribution of donor funds by the state provided a so-called export discipline for big business, thanks to which the national corporations - chaebols - became the drivers of investment and innovation based modernization of the economy. The author defines the main components of the Republic of Korea's success in realizing the national interests of economic development under the conditions of foreign aid in post-war reconstruction. An assessment is made of the possibility and expediency of using South Korean experience in Ukraine.