SOAS public workshop: State Capitalism and Development in East Asia

A free all-day seminar sponsored by the Centre of Korean Studies at SOAS:

State Capitalism and Development in East Asia

Speakers
Jeong Seongjin (Gyeongsang National University)
Lee Jeong-koo (GNU)
Gareth Dale (Brunel University)
Jamie Allinson (University of Westminster)
Owen Miller (SOAS, University of London)

Tuesday, 6 November 2012, 10am-5pm
Room B111, First Floor, Brunei Gallery, SOAS

This will be the second workshop for contributors to the ‘State Capitalism in East Asia’ book project which is being carried out with funding from the SOAS Centre of Korean Studies. The workshop seeks to investigate the role of state capitalism in East Asian economic development, looking at commonalities across the conventional boundaries of ‘capitalist’ and ‘communist’ countries. It brings together scholars from South Korea and the UK who are working on this topic for the first time. The resulting edited volume will be published in 2013.

During the second half of the 20th century the theory of state capitalism became one of the leading Marxist theories analyzing the nature of the so-called communist states of the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and East Asia. However, there have been only sparse attempts to apply the theory to the development of East Asian countries such as China, North Korea and Vietnam. This book project will consider how the theory can illuminate the histories of East Asian countries since the beginning of the capitalist era in the second half of the nineteenth century. As well as examining the ‘communist’ countries of East Asia, the contributors examine whether the theory of state capitalism can be applied to other East Asian societies like Japan and South Korea. They also engage with existing theories of the state and capitalist development in East Asia, most obviously developmental state theory. Above all, the book seeks to use state capitalism theory to offer a more integrated account of capitalist development in twentieth century East Asia that transcends such common categories as ‘state socialism’, ‘developmental state’, and ‘authoritarian capitalism’.

Admission
This event is free and open to all but if you wish to attend, please register by emailing Owen Miller, [email protected]