Dr Joo-In Seong, our visiting researcher from South Korea, is making a presentation on Thursday 26th October on ‘Rural changes in Korea’s modernisation and new rurality for the future’.
Joo-In has been working for Korea Rural Economic Institute (KREI) since 2000 and came to the CCRI in December 2016 for a sabbatical. His presentation is based on his sabbatical research, which has investigated rural community issues and related policies in this country and comparing with rural Korea, which had experienced drastic changes since the beginning of modernisation and nation building in the latter half of the 20th century.
Korea’s modernisation process in the last century is characterised as radical separation from traditional socio-economic structure more than any other developing countries. After the foundation of the republic in 1948, the Korean government carried out nation-wide farmland reform, which paved way for economic development of the nation. And lots of rural residents and farmers took a role in a series of modernisation projects implemented in rural areas all across the country.
During several decades of modernisation, lots of achievements have been made in farm income diversification, infrastructure improvement, technological innovation and so on. But despite all these efforts, there has been growing concern over future sustainability of many rural communities in Korea. Comparing with the modernisation period when the top priority of rural Korea was to overcome backwardness of traditional agrarian society, it is time to seek a new rurality for the future community. In this regard, the presentation will propose several scenarios on the vision of rural Korea and talk about related policy issues.
Joo-In’s sabbatical ends at the end of October, when he will be returning to South Korea. His seminar will take place at the University of Gloucestershire’s Oxstalls Campus in Room LC102. It starts at 12.15pm and lasts for one hour.
CCRI seminars are free to attend, but it would be appreciated if you could reserve a place via the seminar’s Eventbrite page.
