ABSTRACT
This chapter conducts a cultural political economy (CPE) analysis of crisis, crisis discourse, and crisis management with reference to the 1997 economic crisis in South Korea (hereafter, Korea). It aims to illuminate the close but little-examined connection between crisis, crisis discourse, and crisis management in capitalism. Capitalist crisis produces various crisis discourses, that is, interpretations on the nature and causes of the crisis. However, in contrast to crisis discourse as such, the causes and effects of these discourses attract less attention. The causes and effects of crisis management, as well as the relation between crisis discourses and crisis management, attract even less attention. Such little interest in the nature of crisis discourse and management may well mislead and distort our understanding of crises. In other words, it is not possible to understand crises without adequately understanding crisis discourse and management. Crises are not independent from crisis discourse and management. Their nature is defined and shaped by their discursive mediation and practical management. Crisis discourse and management must thus be analyzed as an indispensable part of crisis analysis.
