ABSTRACT
Korea has achieved remarkable economic growth during the last half-century. Korea was among the poorest countries in the world following the devastation of the Korean War (1950-1953). The country’s per capita GNP was less than US$100 (in 1996) in 1960, but increased to US$20,000 in 2007. Such a remarkable achievement in economic growth is closely related to Korea’s successful implementation of the government’s export-oriented and sectorspecific industrial development strategies, development of human resources, as well as innovation policies since the launch of the First Five-Year Economic Development Plan in 1962. The rapid economic growth within a half-century reflects the characteristic of “compressed economic growth” (Park, 2009).
