• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.268-294
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• 1996

Social and population geography in Korea has been developed somewhat later than other special subjects of geography. But in recent years, it has attracted much interests of geographers, and accumulated a considerably large amount of research products. Seen in this context, it is resonable to expect that social and population geography will not only lead the development of geography in the future, but also contribute to the resolution of socio-spatial problems in Korea. From this point of view, we shall retrospect in this paper the progress of social and population geography in Korea since the 1950s, and look out its future prospect and further research tasks. In the first place, we discuss general concepts and major themes of social and population geography, and overview its development process, and than review in more details some important research products which would be categorized into five main subjects, that is, research methodology, urbanization and urban population phenomena, population movement and changing rural life, residential differentiation and urban redevelopment, and urban social life and regional social well-being. Finally, we consider briefly the future prospect and further tasks of social and population geography in Korea.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.47 no.5
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• pp.735-754
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• 2012

Korean society in the 2000 has experienced new many social and spatial issues such as the process of neoliberalism and changes in urban and spatial policies, the development of information and communication technology and reconfiguration of informational social space, radically increasing foreign immigrants and transformation to multicultural society, global warming and environmental injustice, and these new issues have promoted development of social geography in Korea. In addition to a review on them, this paper provides a review on empirical researches on traditional issues which have been dealt with in social geography in the 2000 in Korea. Even though there have been numerous sub-issues, they can be divided into two categories: one is urban and communal social geography including urban housing and residential segregation, urban social problems such as poverty, crime, education, health care, social welfare, urban and rural community building, identity, sense of place, and social movement; the other is social geography of population and migration, including population movement, aged society and social welfare for elderly people, and foreign immigrants and formation of multicultural social space. As some difficult conditions such as path-dependent process of neoliberalism, transformation toward informational, aged, and multicultural society would continue, so social geography in Korea to tackle with these external conditions should deepen its theoretical insights and widen its research issues.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.40 no.3 s.108
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• pp.353-368
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• 2005

Social geography in Korea has been studied centering around urban social geography which has been developed mainly in English world, and then there have been a few concepts and theories that were tested in the rural social geography of Korean rural landscape. This article tried to grasp the conceptual basis of German social geography, and had views on the rural social geography in the relent English world. As a result, the author concluded that the rural landscape would be a representation of rurality, a component of local and national identity, and thought to be not only a physical reality but social, mental, cultural reality On the basis of this consideration, the author explored major concepts which would correspond with the universality and speciality of Korean rurality. They are as follows: 'lineage group' as a geographical socio-group, the 'regionalization' by social groups, and 'the territoriality of settlement' as a social space.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.77-90
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• 1999

This paper aims to understand the changing characteristics of the Kumi region as a locality in Korea through the regional geography of the world-system approach. To illustrate the changing regional characteristics, we analyzed the economic characteristics or position of the Kumi region within the world-economy and its spatial structure with three divisions of Korean capitalist periods: the Japanese colonial period ($1910{\sim}1945$), the social chaos period ($1945{\sim}1960$), and the economic development period ($1960{\sim}$present). In the Japanese colonial and social chaos periods, as Korean society was incorporated into the peripheral zone within the world-System (world-economy), Kumi also was made into a peripheral agricultural area. As a result, the Kumi region shaped the rural spatial structure without an urban center or regional dominant center. In the development period, influenced by the manufacturing-centered economic policy which boosted Korea as a semi-periphery within world-economy, Kumi also was developed into an industrial region(or semi-periphery) with the establishment of the Kumi electronic and textile industrial complex. This industrialization transformed the rural spatial structure of Kumi into a core (urban center)-periphery (rural area) structure. As we identified above, the regional geography of the world-system approach turned out to be a useful methodology to study a locality or internal region. Therefore we should make efforts to study such regions through the regional geography of the world-system approach.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.537-548
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• 2010

As the rapid development of economy in China, the problem in income gaps become a tough and sensitive social problem. Under this social background, this research try to find the main reasons of the income gap among the East China, West China, and the central China, basing on the analysis of its actuality and forming, and then put forward some solution plans. The research shows that in different development levels of China influencing factor of urban-rural income gap is also different. Take East China for example, the education support plays an important part of narrowing income gap. The influence of education support on urban-rural income gaps more significant than industrialization, what is more, its influence has the more reinforce trend, while in the less developed central and western part in China, what can narrowing income gap significantly is industrialization and the support for agriculture. Therefore, in order to solve the problem of income gap between urban and rural areas in China radically, it is not enough to perform medical insurance reform and social insurance reform in the whole county. Besides this, we should perform other kinds of reformation countermeasures which have their regional characteristics. For example, in eastern, the regional governments should reinforce the education system; in central china, they should focus on developing industry; in western, the regional governments should increase the expense to support the agricultural development, and so on. With these countermeasures, they could not only relieve the gap between urban and rural areas in China, but also ensure to develop economy substantially and stably in the whole country.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.50 no.6
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• pp.659-675
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• 2015

This study explores the status, characteristics and problems of urban-to-rural migration policy in Gyeongbuk Province, and suggests some improvements based on this analysis. Gyeongbuk Province enacted local ordinances related to urban-to-rural migration for the first time in Korea, and has expanded the area of its own projects in addition to the central government's support projects. Consequently, the degree of satisfaction for the support projects in Gyeongbuk Province is higher than in other provinces. Problems of the support projects for urban-to-rural migration are the lack of role sharing between central and lower level local government, and the lack of connectivity among the relevant departments; the non-reflection of regional characteristics and attributes of urban-to-rural migrants (household); and the insufficient satisfaction of policy demands by non-agricultural urban-to-rural migrants. Improvements for these problems include establishing governance that involves urban-to-rural migrants in addition to the existing policy actors, and institutionalizing the project to properly embed this governance in the region. In addition to economic and physical support, diverse programs based on the adaptive cycle, 'non-agricultural rural jobs' for nonagricultural urban-to-rural migrants, and support programs for professional competency enhancement contributing to rural communities should be developed.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.99-113
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• 1997

The purpose of this study is to find out about the cause and adaptation process of urban households going to rural areas for agricultural management(Kwihyang nongga) through the microscopic analysis of a case study. Research results are summarized in the followings. The cause of Kwihyang nongga before the 1980s was generally due to the social causes like the support of dependent family or rural-to-urban migrants' maladjustment in urban society. After the 1980s, however, it was related to the economic reasons such as the increase of households' income by commercial agriculture more than the social ones. Most of Kwihyang nongga was traditionally the households which came back to their native places, rural areas. Recently the urban households which did not originally come from rural areas are going to rural space because of the cultivation of high profit oriented agricultural products. Recent Kwihyang nongga increased the size of commercial agriculture through leased farmland, not by a purchase of agricultural land. Even though the number of Kwihyang nongga is now a few, it is expected that the influence of Kwihyang nongga on rural society will be various and high because it consists of young generation. The increase of Kwihyang nongga may be one of the ways to mitigate the decreasing rate of utilization of agricultural lands due to the labor shortage of rural areas after industrialization. To solve rural problems related to underpopulation, it is necessary to establish the active plicies of helping Kwihyang nongga. The actions for Kwihyang nongga ought to emphasize the improvement of educational conditions and living facilities as well as financial aids and the improvement of farming conditions.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.255-267
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• 1996

The so-called Cultural and Historical Geography, sometimes called even as the Historical and Cultural Geography, has been defined as an interdiscipline that encompasses several disciplines in Korea. Scholars with various academic background have participated in the academic activity of the Association of Korean Cultural and Historical Geographers that was organized in the late 1980s. The academic majors of these participants are cultural geography, historical geography, history of geography, urban geography rural geography, economic geography, social and economic history anthropology, landscape architecture, and so on. It was in the 1960s that articles about the Cultural and Historical Geography appeared for the first time in the major academic journals in Korea. The pioneers of publishing these articles in the 1960s continued to conduct their research, while training students majoring in the Cultural and Historical Geography in the 1970s. All of these pioneers and their students were very active in the formation of identity vrith the Cultural and Historical Geography In the 1980s. Cultural and Historical Geography in Korea took a great leap forward both in quantity and in quality. The number of articles in the journal increased substantially, and the range of research theme and methodology extended in a great deal. It was also in the late 1980s that the Association of Korean Cultural and Historical Geographers was organized in Seoul, Korea, and this association began to publish a professional journal named Cultural and Historical Geography once a year. In the 1990s, single-authored books dealing with Korean Cultural and Historcial Geography began to appear in public as textbooks or research monographs. These books are expected to speed up the spread of Cultural and Historical Geography in Korea. If it continues to grow further both in quantity and in quality as it has been, Cultural and Historical Geography in Korea will be able to stand as an independent academic field in the future. Until then, however, it cannot but avoid its mission to contribute to an integrated development of human geography in Korea. It has already gained not only its own merit in the humanistic perspective but also its own strength in its synthetic understanding.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.239-253
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• 2008

This paper aims to explore the viability of a rural-industrial complex neighbouring in the metropolitan area and suggest policy implications for the restructuring of the rural industrial complex. In particular, the paper focuses on the location and management practices of the firms operating in the industrial complex. Research shows that the key elements of the viability of the rural industrial complex in Koryung-Gun are the geographical and relational proximities to the metropolitan city of Daegu and the decentralization of urban industries towards rural areas neighbouring in the large city as a result of the deterioration of location conditions in the large city. It is revealed that the major pull factors of location are 'availability of cheap industrial sites', 'agglomeration in a specialized industry' and 'proximity to major customers and suppliers' rather than 'availability of labour pool'. However, it shows that 'weak university-industry linkages' and 'insufficiency of cooperation culture' are the major limitations to attracting firms. In the context of pub1ic policy, the author argues that the restructuring of the rural industrial complex should be sought to promote social infrastructures centered on networks and learning rather than firm centered financial and tax incentives.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.187-210
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• 2005

The purpose of this study is to examine the spatial characteristics of the longevity phenomenon and long-live areas in Korea where a rapid aging process is undergoing. Population data from 1966 to 2000 at the county level are analyzed to understand aging process and changes of longevity degree by regions. The relationship between the degree of longevity and a region's natural environments and distance to a metropolis has been analyzed to understand regional factors of longevity. The findings from the study are summarized as follows. Firstly, the rural regions in Honam show the highest degree of longevity in the nation. Secondly, the areas of the high degree of longevity has recently shifted and/or expanded from the islands and seashore areas of southwestern region to inland mountainous areas around Soback Mountain. Southern islands and seashore regions used to show the nation's highest degree of longevity in the 1970s. Thirdly, the analysis of regional environment factors indicated that longevity has more related to a precipitation and an average altitude than temperature. Fourthly, in order to identify the longevity factors in urban areas, social and economic factors should be considered beyond the natural environmental factors.