ABSTRACT
Contemporary Korea is widely known for its energetic policy for 'cultural industries'. This chapter suggests that the policy's initial development and rapid growth, which have been deeply situated in the neoliberal transformation of Korean society since the 1990s. It seems at first glance paradoxical that neoliberalisation has been an important overarching context for the development of state-led, active cultural industries policy in Korea. Another area where the Korean government has shown impressive policy capacity is the mobilisation of private investment via public-private funds and the consequent increase of the scale of cultural financing. From the very beginning, Korean cultural industries policy was guided by the discourse of new economy and the nation's economic strategy. Despite the frequent references to 'small government' and 'decentralisation', Korean governments consistently expanded a state-led policy in cultural industries. However, the failure of the cultural archetype project hardly deterred policy makers from their efforts to turn culture into a fictitious commodity.
