Author: Donald Kirk
Publisher: Palgrave, 2000
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Donald Kirk explores the origins and effects of Korea’s economic crisis. He traces the events that constituted the crisis, including a series of scandals at the height of the Korean miracle; the efforts of President Kim Dae Jung to curb the overweening power of the chaebol, or conglomerates; and the outside intervention by the IMF and the country’s desperate efforts to obtain foreign investment. At the same time, the book explores the pressures of coming to terms with North Korea. Based on the author’s original reporting from the onset of the crisis through the intervention of the IMF, this book is the first to look at Korea’s experience in the regional turmoil of Asia.
LKL says:
This book brings together in one place the reportage of one of the key foreign journalists based in Seoul during the 1990s. With access to politicians, press releases and Korean and foreign businessmen, Donald Kirk assembles an account which highlights what a tangled mess things were. At times it’s difficult to see the wood for the trees, but that’s how it must have felt at the time.
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