ABSTRACT
South Korea (hereafter referred to as Korea) has long been seen as an unqualified success story, with per capita gross domestic product (GDP) rising at an average annual rate of nearly 7 per cent since the mid-1960s. Yet, the formerly successful strategy was tested to its limits, rather unexpectedly, with the outbreak of the Asian financial crisis in 1997. The resulting economic meltdown triggered a dramatic change in economic policies and, more generally, in the way Korea relates to the global economy.
