State autonomy, state capacity, and public policy: The development of social security policy in Korea

This dissertation examines the developmental process of the social security policy in Korea. This study adopts two important structural properties of the state as conceptual tools: state autonomy (the state's position in relation to social classes) and state capacity (organizational characteristics of the state). This study examines specific empirical conditions generating these two structural properties as they evolve through the historical formation of the Korean state. Its particular focus is the industrialization, class formation, and organizational characteristics of the state. It then explains how these two structural properties of state autonomy and state capacity shaped the timing of policy adoption and the form and content of social security programs in relation to their redistributive effects. To this end, it examines each phase of the social security policy development, including the emergence, development, and expansion and reform phases.;The Korean state formation reveals the characteristics of state autonomy to include strong instrumental autonomy and the lack of structural autonomy. Korea's state capacity is characterized by an imbalance between economic and social policy apparatuses and a lack of a coherent social planning and implementation body. As a result, the developmental pattern of the Korean social security policy can be characterized as emerging late and following an asymmetrical development process with regressive redistributive effects. This suggests that the creation of a social security system with significant redistributive possibilities should entail not only changes in the power relations of society in order to generate structural autonomy. It also demands changes in the organizational structure of the state in order to implement reforms effectively.