Urban Sustainability in Transformation: A Case Study of Seoul

Abstract

While cities across the world are adopting urban sustainability plans and pursuing ‘sustainable development,’ the question of how these urban sustainability plans have made our cities indeed sustainable is a subject of debate. Some scholars are skeptical about whether urban sustainability planning challenges or reproduces existing power imbalance in the growth politics in cities. Given the current trend that the concept of sustainability has become embedded in our culture, little is known about the urban politics around urban sustainability plans and their effectiveness in promoting balanced sustainability in Asian cities. Using a case study of Seoul through in-depth interviews, this study examines the urban politics around the decision-making process and the implementation of sustainability plans in Seoul. As a rare case of recent rapid socio-economic transformations with the legacy of a developmental state, Korea serves as an example of how these transformations are likely to have for the urban politics of sustainability policies in other Asian countries. As conclusions, developmental states like Korea with a centralized governance system tend to use a “sustainability fix” that is heavily focused on ‘pro-growth’ development. With globalization, privatization, and democratization, the growth machine politics around urban sustainability planning in Korea is similar to that observed in the Western context. However, in Seoul, the growth machine is heavily influenced by the federal government and Mayoral leadership. This is because of the embedded legacy of the developmental state. In addition, with increased democratization and a growing role of civic groups in urban politics, we see a move towards “just sustainability” in urban sustainability planning in Korea.