• SUVANNABHUMI
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.271-303
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• 2023

In 1991, Malaysia, under the leadership of then-Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, launched an ambitious 30-year national development program known as Vision 2020. The goal of this program was to transform Malaysia into a First World developed nation by the year 2020. One of the aspirations of the program was to create a psychologically liberated, secure, ethical, and mature democratic society. Vision 2020 is a failure and Malaysia is still not a mature democracy. This article identifies four main areas that make up a flawed democracy practiced in Malaysia, and shows how they work against the country's aspirations to become a developed nation. The electoral system is rigged to help the incumbent remain in power. The widespread practices of money politics have become a curse to the country. The press and media organizations are restricted. Civil society activities are suppressed. As a result of these issues, Malaysia will not be able to achieve the status of a developed nation, lacking democratic accountability and inclusive institutions.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.71-94
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• 1990

This paper reviews the rationale of monetary and banking intervention by an outside authority, either the government or the central bank, and seeks to delineate clearly the optimal limits to the monetary and banking deregulation currently underway in Korea as well as on a global scale. Furthermore, this paper seeks to establish an objective and balanced view on the role of the central bank, especially in light of the current discussion on the restructuring of Korea's central bank, which has been severely contaminated by interest-group politics. The discussion begins with the recognition that the modern free banking school and the new monetary economics are becoming formidable challenges to the traditional role of the government or the central bank in the monetary and banking sector. The paper reviews six arguments that have traditionally been presented to support intervention: (1) the possibility of an over-issue of bank notes under free banking instead of central banking; (2) externalities in and the public good nature of the use of money; (3) economies of scale and natural monopoly in producing money; (4) the need for macro stabilization policy due to the instability of the real sector; (5) the external effects of bank failure due to the inherent instability of the existing banking system; and (6) protection for small banknote users and depositors. Based on an analysis of the above arguments, the paper speculates on the optimal role of the government or central bank in the monetary and banking system and the optimal degree of monetary and banking deregulation. By contrast to the arguments for free banking or laissez-faire monetary systems, which become fashionable in recent years, monopoly and intervention by the government or central bank in the outside money system can be both necessary and optimal. In this case, of course, an over-issue of fiat money may be possible due to political considerations, but this issue is beyond the scope of this paper. On the other hand, the issue of inside monies based on outside money could indeed be provided for optimally under market competition by private institutions. A competitive system in issuing inside monies would help realize, to the maxim urn extent possible, external economies generated by using a single outside money. According to this reasoning, free banking activities will prevail in the inside money system, while a government monopoly will prevail in the outside money system. This speculation, then, also implies that the monetary and banking deregulation currently underway should and most likely will be limited to the inside money system, which could be liberalized to the fullest degree. It is also implied that it will be impractical to deregulate the outside money system and to allow market competition to provide outside money, in accordance with the arguments of the free banking school and the new monetary economics. Furthermore, the role of the government or central bank in this new environment will not be significantly different from their current roles. As far as the supply of fiat money continues to be monopolized by the government, the control of the supply of base money and such related responsibilities as monetary policy (argument(4)) and the lender of the last resort (argument (5)) will naturally be assigned to the outside money supplier. However, a mechanism for controlling an over-issue of fiat money by a monopolistic supplier will definitely be called for (argument(1)). A monetary policy based on a certain policy rule could be one possibility. More importantly, the deregulation of the inside money system would further increase the systemic risk inherent in the current fractional banking system, while enhancing the efficiency of the system (argument (5)). In this context, the role of the lender of the last resort would again become an instrument of paramount importance in alleviating liquidity crises in the early stages, thereby disallowing the possibility of a widespread bank run. Similarly, prudential banking supervision would also help maintain the safety and soundness of the fully deregulated banking system. These functions would also help protect depositors from losses due to bank failures (argument (6)). Finally, these speculations suggest that government or central bank authorities have probably been too conservative on the issue of the deregulation of the financial system, beyond the caution necessary to preserve system safety. Rather, only the fullest deregulation of the inside money system seems to guarantee the maximum enjoyment of external economies in the single outside money system.

• World Technopolis Review
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.276-286
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• 2013

"Federal investments into the future of a region" - pushing economy in the right direction or throwing tax money into a black hole? Hot-headed contentions keep circulating within politics and economy discussing the effect of technology centers and their sustainability within a region. Start-up support and technological infrastructure with the auxiliary service of well developed sector-oriented clusters as a fertile soil for successful networks are an undeniable advantage of well organised technology centers. Sceptic contemporaries still hold against that in order to implement such a center millions of federal funds for infrastructure and operation are invested. What output of this tax money is verifiable in the long run? The case of Dortmund provides substantial food for this necessary and relevant discussion. Now, after 27 years of history of the TechnologieZentrumDortmund, TZDO for short, a positive balance can be drawn. This is not just a matter of personal belief and stance. Fortunately, a recent study on the economic effects of the TZDO on the whole region was performed by the Center of Applied Economy Research M$\ddot{u}$nster, Germany (Gundel and Luttmann 2008). The result is clear and measurable: the TZDO has shown to be of great impact on the positive development of a whole region. This paper presents an account of the approach of the TechnologieZentrumDortmund and its current strategy and mode of operation to reach an utmost of effectiveness of personal and pecuniary input in establishing economic success for the region of Dortmund. An immense change of minds, employment opportunities and a massive structural change of the whole region were some of the ambitious aims that had to be reached and that are achieved to a large extent.

• Korean journal of communication and information
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• v.63
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• pp.5-25
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• 2013

Korean society suffers from severe divisions represented by bi-polarization and collapse of the middle class. Intensive demanding on expanding social welfare budget has emerged in accordance with such a dramatic shift. Social consensus moving toward well-financed welfare policy, however, happens to meet political opposition supported by the discourse of fiscal soundness. This paper thus pays particular attention to deciphering the discursive structure in way of understanding how discourses bring public policy into play. For this purpose, news articles about fiscal soundness collected from 8 national newspapers have been analyzed in terms of frame, attitude, perspective and world view. Research results show, first of all, that there exist persistent competition between two frames identified as 'reduced tax with fiscal discipline' and 'increased tax with welfare money.' While the 'reduced tax' frame favors in maintaining tax cut at the expense of welfare budjet, the frame of 'increased tax' supports such arguments as the flexible employment of fiscal soundness and prosperity of national community helped by widening tax revenues. Also did these frames include a number of sub-frames like welfare populism, partisan politics, trickle down effect, tax bonanza for the rich, universal welfare and market over-reactions in order to bolster its logical authority. Media's active taking a part in penetrating supportive frames in line with political stance was found as well. Taking into account both the discursive structure upheld by frames and politics materialized by the media, the authors argue that public policies should be considered more as discourse than fixed reality. Shedding additional light on understanding the interplay among public opinion, policies and media discourse is of another importance for further study.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• v.56 no.2
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• pp.255-276
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• 2010

Despite some critics' efforts to highlight Shelley's political fruitfulness, they tend to disregard meaningful differences that Shelley has from other Jacobin radicals of his times. Accordingly, the critics tackle his apparent incoherence revealed in A Philosophical View of Reform; the first two sections contain a keen insight into the socio-political injustice prevalent in Britain and the reasons behind it, while the third section withdraws from the previous radical position and settles with a moderate electorate reform. This paper argues that recent developments in post-structuralist and post-Marxist theory help to clearly assess Shelley's political position. Emphasizing that the Jacobin concept of revolution is incompatible with the plurality and opening which a radical democracy requires, post-marxists such as Ernest Laclau and Chantal Mouffee claim that a more viable form of political resistance is to expose repression and force involved in hegemonic articulations. For them, dislocation, a distabilization of a discourse that results from the emergence of events which cannot be domesticated, symbolized, or integrated within the discourse, opens up the possibility of freedom for agents. A Philosophical View of Reform is an attempt to dislocate the discourses of monarchy and paper money by exposing their social and historical constructiveness and their repressive exclusion of alternative discourses. The political goal of this essay is to awaken subjects within a hegemonic structure by decentering the structure and to make them act by stimulating new discoursive constructions.

• Korean journal of communication and information
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• v.50
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• pp.164-186
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• 2010

Korean society, suffered from a severe currency crisis in 1997, had scarcely missed another market meltdown in 2008. However, neither economic fundamentals nor has political stability little to do with the recent crises. This paper thus projects the possibility of 'self-fulfilling crisis' in which the media took a critical part in amplifying 'crisis discourses.' For the purpose of understanding of media's impact on such a crisis, at first, this paper chose 'September Crisis in 2008' as a case study. While collecting news articles about the crisis, then, total 118 news articles collected from mainstream newspapers such as DongA-ilbo and Money Today have been analyzed in terms of media frame and discourse strategies. Research results showed that not only has the crisis discourse been shifted by economic situations, but the media re-constructed economic realities in way of justifying their political ideology and loyal readership. Taking those findings into consideration, in final, the authors urged the media to improve their performance by embracing more responsible and professional manners.

• Korean journal of communication and information
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• v.80
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• pp.115-142
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• 2016

This study aims to reveal the content of and logic behind a recent negative public sentiment toward female idols with the example of a debate over songstress IU's fourth album that was released late last year. While previous studies on fandom have focused on the identification process towards entertainers and making community, a recent phenomenon of "anti-fandom" or "malicious comments" implies that more research is needed on negative emotions such as hostility or schadenfreude (feelings of pleasure from others' misfortunes). Schadenfreude is a social sentiment that originated in modern liberalism, which features contradictions between public equality and private ownership, and that has been intensified in neoliberalism, which features a maximization of this contradiction centering on a meritocracy. Celebrities in Korea often become the targets of schadenfreude, which is associated with the suspicion that they gain popularity not from their abilities but from "just being popular." It should also be noted that this kind of schadenfreude operates differently between male and female entertainers. Specifically, the acquisition of money and fame by modern women whose presence used to be located in the private possessions of males is considered to be due to their unjustified use of sexuality. This is also the background of the recent online misogyny culture in Korea. In this context, IU, who had been successful at building a differentiated image of "sister-like idol artist," became a valid target. Although accusing IU of utilizing pedophilia reflects a stalemate that a current politics of sexual violence faces, it rather damages the name of an individual than attracts public attention to the structural causes of childsexualabuse. This is why I see the way that pedophilia was used in the debate over IU as a schadenfreude. Consequently, the term pedophilia here contributes to an expansion of the entertainment economy that is sustained by rises and falls of the celebrities' stock prices.

• Korean journal of communication and information
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• v.25
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• pp.7-40
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• 2004

Today, nuclear energy conflict is caused from the dangerous radioactive material. The main party of this conflict are politic and economic systems which deride nuclear energy, and the persons concerned which it oppose and the anti-nuclear environment group. If the nuclear waste is transported from one nation to another nation, multi national anti-nuclear group appears as conflict party. We call this domestic and transnational risk communication new social movement. From the viewpoint of system theory, the new social movement can mean the offensive development of self-reference which withstand the "technicalization of communication" through the "symbolically generalized communication media" like money and power. By comparing Northeast Asia and Europe, the nuclear energy conflict did not show a big difference in the selection of nuclear waste storing site. In the Northeast Asia, when Taiwan exports the nuclear waste to North Korea, the international conflict broke out. In Europe, Germany has a hard experience with the construction-plan for the re-treating plant that produces the plutonium from the dangerous nuclear waste, and with the transnational transport of the nuclear waste. The new social movement aims the global paradigm which is able to guarantee the subtainability of ecological environment. The nuclear conflict in the "world risk society" is solved through the "discourse-alliance" which accomplishes sub-politics by crossing the border of class, nation and system.

• Journal of architectural history
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.19-34
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• 2013

The founder of the 'Paik In - Je House in Ga Hui Dong' in the Bukchon Hanok Village was found as Han Sang- Ryong (1880.11.14. ~ 1947.?) and the time when it was built was by the late June in 1913. Han Sang Ryong was the director of the HanSung Bank during the Japanese colonial period and he was the industrialist in the management committee and the economy coordinator in the economic area. The way how he could accumulate the huge amount of money was because his Uncle Lee Yoon Yong and Lee Wan Yong brothers were participating in various concessions under the protection of the colony government such as Chosun colonial government. Through seven years of preparation for building the mansion, the social function he presented to his house was 'the house built for the banquet hall'. He invited many celebrities of politics and economy to this house and built his fundaments for his social activity through interactions. To solve the construction concept, he used the way of 'duplicity and juxtaposition', and his mansion was reborn as a modernized urban Hanok through the reinterpretation by his program out of the old Confucian rules. Han Sang Ryong's mansion is significant and valuable in the period since it was a pioneer in challenging the creative housing in the developing stage of Hanok in early modern era, and the highest social level people were trying to show off through the Hanok as a product.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.414-423
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• 1973

Before the modern education was introduced in Korea men had the opportunity to be educated. Women's education was limited to a small number of girls belonging to ruling class. It was the men who got a job to earn the money for the family. The customary law prohibited women from being employed. They were to stay at home engaged in household affairs. This phenomenon has undergone a change when modern education was adopted which gave women the equal opportunity in education. The modernization of the country required a lot of educated and skilled labour. Since 1945 when Korea was liberated from the Japanese colonial administration the modernization programme has been worked out in every field such as industry, education, culture and politics, etc. The traditional grand family was transformed to nuclear family. The migration took place from country to town. With the adoption of compulsory education in the primary school the schoolgirls are increased in great number. The number of girls has been increased every year in Middle Schools, High schools and Universities. Even if boys still outnumber girls in all education institutions, the rate of increase of girl students are higher than that of boy students. Accordingly women are given more opportunity than ever for the employment vis-a-vis men. The number of employed women has been increasing greatly in recent years inproportion to the acceleration of industrialization. The type of their job is also various and colorful ranging from factory worker to doctor and lawyer. There are some problems to be solved with respect to the improvement of women's education. The improved women's education should be reviewed light of the fact that inequality still exists between men and women in occupation and wages, and that women is required of good education contributable to the better Korean society.