ABSTRACT
As I mentioned in Chapter 1, the Korean authoritarian governments adopted and enforced industrial promotion, compulsory acquisitions and/or mergers, and investment designations without sufficient business consent or despite business opposition; they did not choose to pursue a state-led industrial adjustment with a sufficient agreement of business firms, a negotiated industrial adjustment among the state, business, and labour, or a company-led industrial adjustment through the market. The policy instruments for the state-controlled industrial adjustments in South Korea had been characterized by discretionary field manipulation, mainly in credit allocation, and discretionary command, mainly in dealing with financially ill-managed firms. The government had depended heavily on discretionary command.
