• 지역과문화
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.47-72
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• 2019

The purpose of this paper is to explore what roles can and should regional culture play in establishing a regional innovation system, which has been recently described as an essential factor for balanced regional development and specialized regional development. In doing so, we first investigated key concepts and discourses regarding regional innovation system and examined the success factors of a regional innovation system. We also explored how the Korean policy makers have developed the nation's regional innovation policy and regional cultural policy in order to understand the policy context and its limitations. After examining the theoretical background, we reviewed the representative cases of regional innovation in Japan, Yufuin and Yubari, to grasp the way in which 'culture' plays its roles in the formation of the regional innovation system. Since culture has a role as a unique sector, such as art and content industry, as well as a community's style of life, this study tried to explore the aspects and ways of how culture can contribute to the establishment of regional innovation systems considering these distinctive levels. In drawing the implications of the case study, we found that special attention is required for the 'process of formation' of regional innovation systems. We also confirmed that the success of the core activities at each stage heavily relies on the culture of the region; in order to fully understand the relations, it is necessary to re-establish the existing concept of culture and cultural policy with a more holistic perspective.