Branding_South_Korea_in_a_Competitive_World_Order_Discourses_and_Dispositives_in_Neoliberal_Governmentality

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Branding South Korea in a Competitive World
Order: Discourses and Dispositives in Neoliberal
Governmentality
Juliette Schwak 줄리엣 쉥크
To cite this article: Juliette Schwak 줄줄줄 줄줄 (2016): Branding South Korea in a Competitive
World Order: Discourses and Dispositives in Neoliberal Governmentality, Asian Studies Review,
DOI: 10.1080/10357823.2016.1193474
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Asian Studies Review, 2016
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10357823.2016.1193474
© 2016 Asian Studies Association of Australia
Branding South Korea in a Competitive World Order:
Discourses and Dispositives in Neoliberal Governmentality
Juliette Schwak
City University of Hong Kong
ABSTRACT
Since 2008, the South Korean administration has invested significant
budgetary and political resources in its nation-branding strategy,
involving the private sector and Korean citizens in this endeavour.
This article takes Korea as an exemplary case study of the way many
states have enrolled their citizens, through nation branding, in the
construction of a collective competitive identity. This study is based
on an empirically deductive methodology, looking at the industry
literature on nation branding, official sources, iconography and
videos from the Korean nation-branding campaign, and drawing on
interviews with actors in and observers of this campaign. I suggest
that Korean nation branding should be seen as a continuation of the
capitalist developmental project initiated by Park Chung-hee in the
1960s.LeeMyung-bak’snation-brandingcampaignispartofaseriesof
strategies aiming at transforming South Korea into a successful global
site of capitalist accumulation.This path-dependency involves citizen
mobilisation, and this is analysed through a Foucauldian prism: this
article shows that although modalities of social control have evolved
with the democratisation in 1987, they still play a role, combining
coercion and non-coercive technologies of the self, in seeking to
transform Korean citizens into competitive capitalist subjects.
Introduction
Since the 1990s, the phenomenon of nation branding has attracted the attention of pol-
icy-makers and academics. The creation and diffusion of nation brands has been taken
seriously by governments in both so-called “developing” and post-industrialised nations
(Jansen, 2008). I define nation branding as an apparatus of discourses and practices car-
ried out by cooperating private and public sectors, aiming to create a highly competitive
national image in the global marketplace of nations through corporate marketing and brand
management techniques and tools. A successful nation brand is assumed to be able to
compete for international capital: tourists, investment, import-export trade, skilled labour
and highly educated international students; and to foster the competitiveness of national
companies. It also helps to “convey an image of legitimacy and authority in diplomatic
arenas” (Aronczyk, 2013, p. 16).
KEYWORDS
Nation branding;
competitiveness; South
Korea; neoliberalism;
governmentality
CONTACT Juliette Schwak schwakjuliette@gmail.com
Downloadedby[JulietteSchwak]at01:0212June2016

2 J. Schwak
Some observers find it hard to determine how seriously to take nation branding.
According to Sussman, nation branding appears to be “an [obviously] exaggerated exten-
sion of neoliberal globalisation and commodification, the notion that everything is for
sale and that the potential market value of a nation … can be traded on international
exchanges like stock equity” (2012, p. 43), thus requiring no intellectual scrutiny. Nation
branding could indeed be mocked as a mere CNN commercial for a country’s fine wines and
beaches. Nevertheless, I contend that it is a tangible phenomenon, involving both national
governments and consultants intervening directly for them, and highlights more than the
commodification of the national form. It reveals powerful global normative standards, and
Foucauldian dispositives implemented in different sites of power, for citizens’ subjectivities
to match the standards of normalcy of global capitalism.
The Republic of Korea (hereafter, Korea) has invested significant budgetary and political
resources towards its nation-branding strategy. Korean administrations from the 1990s
have repeatedly engaged the services of nation-branding consultants, including two active
promoters of nation branding – Simon Anholt and Keith Dinnie – in order to present the
image of a modern and global country to the world, and especially to a Western audience.
The Korean example reveals the complex manifestations of combined endogenous and
global causes. While it is certain that Korean nation branding exemplifies a global capitalist
normalcy framework, it has been shaped too by the specific history of the Korean peninsula
and Korea’s remarkable development trajectory. Therefore, this article aims to show not
only how Korea is subject to global capitalist structures, but also its agency in reproducing
these frameworks.
I suggest here that Korean nation branding needs to be put into historical perspective,
and understood within the Korean capitalist developmental project initiated by General
Park Chung-hee in 1961. Successive Korean governments have aimed at making Korea a
leading nation, a “top country” (Kim, 2014, p. 4), and the contemporary nation-branding
effort is intrinsically linked to this strategy, characterised by a hierarchical vision of world
order. Some authors have considered nation branding to be an essentially domestic exercise,
related to nation building (Valaskivi, 2013, p. 6; Barr, 2011). I argue that Korean nation
branding is also directed towards a global audience, aiming at completing the developmental
project launched in the 1960s and helping Korea to become a central player within the inter-
national system. The different strategies implemented to transform Korea into a first-class
capitalist country share similar features to a state-led, capital-oriented project that seeks to
give Korea what its elites see as a legitimacy it lacks on the global scene. Nation branding
is thus a logical step towards the global recognition of Korea as a successfully globalised
competition state (Cerny, 1997; Fougner, 2006).
In turn, this project could not be completed without mobilising Korean citizens. This
article will argue that although modalities of social control have evolved with the democ-
ratisation of the country, they still play a central role in transforming Korea into a top-end
capitalist country. While the military regime used more explicitly coercive forms of con-
trol, the contemporary democratic state has not dismissed coercion altogether, but tends
to favour non-coercive “technologies of the self”, characteristic, for Foucault, of neoliberal
governmentality (Foucault, 2004a). In the nation-branding strategy, they take the form of
the imperative to “live Brand Korea”. To attain its global audience, the nation brand has
first to be appropriated by the domestic audience, and citizens are made responsible for
becoming the nation brand’s ambassadors. Thanks to these domestic changes, Brand Korea

Asian Studies Review 3
becomes acceptable to the actors “who count” on the global scene (Personal interview,
foreign reporter, February 2014, Seoul).
In support of this argument, I first explain my theoretical framework and justify the
discursive focus of this article. I then outline the emergence of the phenomenon of nation
branding, its discourse and practice. This is followed by a discussion of the common devel-
opmental project of successive Korean governments from the early 1960s to the 2000s.
Although Korea became a formally democratic nation from the late 1980s,1
and authori-
tarian mass mobilisation is not the style of the day, citizens can still be targets of develop-
mental mobilisation. To show this continuity, I present the main features of President Lee
Myung-bak’s nation-branding project.
The article is based on an empirically deductive methodology. I first focused on the
empirical sources and then elaborated a historical and theoretical framework, inspired
by Foucauldian critique, to propose my core arguments. My empirical research took as
primary material the industry literature on nation branding, as well as the official sources,
iconography and videos that have been associated with Korean nation branding, together
with interviews (with scholars, journalists, nation-branding consultants and Korean public
officials).
Thinking with Foucault: Discourse Analysis, Power and Governmentality
This article focuses on the discourses of Korean nation branding, and the Foucauldian dis-
positifs [dispositives] that emerge from these discourses. While my analytical framework is
that of discourse analysis, this should not imply a dichotomous gap between discourse and
social reality. I focus on discourses because they are at the root of what becomes tangible as
social reality. Shapiro comments on Foucault’s method and observes “a shift from ways of
seeing …. to a focus on the ‘statement’, or collection of statements (discourses)” (Shapiro,
2014, p. 3; Foucault, 2008). Foucault operates a shift from the analysis of what is tangible,
what can be perceived, to the analysis of discourses and the reality that they create. Far
from considering that discourses are only intangible and bear no material consequences,
he argues that they form sets of practices that in turn form the reality that discourses are
about. This is a core assumption of the present work: that there exists an intangible set of
discourses on competitiveness that has tangible effects because it creates practices that
can be materially observed. Focusing on statements and discourses is central for a critical
epistemology (Fairclough, 1995). Discourse analysis functions as a methodological tool to
reveal the ideational framework informing a set of discourses. The discourse is not con-
sidered to be a reflection of reality; rather, it constitutes reality in itself. In the documents
and speeches analysed, comments and arguments correspond to relationships of power,
exclusion and inclusion.
Foucault calls dispositives the relations that turn discourses from language “into practices
involving complex interrelationships among agencies and institutions”. These dispositives
comprise “discourses, institutions, architectural forms, administrative measures, scientific
statements, philosophical, moral and philanthropic propositions … the said as much as the
unsaid … the elements of the apparatus” (Deleuze, 2004, p. 3). These dispositives, in turning
mere discourses into practices, are responsible for implementing and reproducing power.
Stemming from discourses, these dispositives are the workings of power at the micro-level,
and are precisely what I attempt to reveal in this analysis of South Korean nation branding.

4 J. Schwak
Evaluating the changes in social reality that these dispositives create requires a different
methodology, and will be the object of further research, notably through survey research.
Identifying discourses and dispositives is an essential first step in this process, for social
change cannot take place without the mediation of these dispositives. For instance, identi-
fying the administrative measures and the institutions (to mention a few dispositives only)
participating in the apparatus of competitiveness in Korea is crucial in creating a topogra-
phy of power within Korean society, and understanding how the discursive emphasis on
competitiveness penetrates society at all levels.
It might seem irrelevant to speak about mass mobilisation and citizen control now that
Korea is a legal democracy. Nevertheless, although modalities of citizen control have evolved
with the democratisation process, they still play a central role in the nation-branding project,
and are embedded in a more general phenomenon: technologies of the self in the neoliberal
governmentality (Foucault, 2004a). These sets of modalities of government, analysed by
Foucault, characterise the neoliberal project of government wherever it becomes hegemonic.
Let us recall very briefly how Foucault’s analysis of power transforms traditional analy-
ses of power and can shed light on processes of control under a non-authoritarian regime.
Foucault analyses how particular discursive structures and knowledge conﬁgurations create
“norms, rules and standards of accepted or normal behaviour, with respect to which agency
may be evaluated and evaluates itself” (Manokha, 2009, p. 439). For Deleuze, Foucault is
a “new cartographer”, meaning that Foucault shifts power analysis from a typology that
located the origin of power in a single place to a typology in which power is diffuse and
“can no longer accept a limited localisation” (Deleuze, 2004).
The power Foucault describes in his works is structural and not reducible to properties.
Thus, power comes from numerous discursive structures: agents do not possess it. When
agents use power, they negotiate with the dominant perspective of what is normalcy and
deviance. It is positive because it produces behaviour in accordance with the standard of
what is acceptable (Foucault, 1975). While traditional analyses of power in political science
have emphasised negative and tangible variables – that is, repression, coercion or imped-
iment – Foucault introduces a new way of thinking about power, avoiding the classical
definition of power and the capacity of an agent to force another agent to act according to
what the first agent desires, under the force of coercion. Lemke notes that “[t]he relationship
proper to power would not therefore be sought on the side of violence or of struggle, nor
on that of voluntary linking…, but rather in the area of the singular mode of action, neither
warlike nor juridical, which is government” (Lemke, 2001 p. 52).
Introducing the notions of government of Others/government of the Self, Foucault
underlines the co-determined emergence of modern sovereign states and modern
autonomous individuals (Foucault, 2008). Following this, he defines governmentality as “the
encounter between the techniques of domination exercised over others, and the techniques
of the self” (Foucault, 2004b, p. 655). While “government of others” refers to a situation in
which an agent exercises power over another agent to make him comply with the normalcy
framework, “technologies of the self” refer to voluntary practices through which individuals
not only control their behaviour to act according to what they perceive as “normalcy”, but
also try to transform themselves to meet the requirements of these norms (Foucault, 1997a).
Foucault’s work therefore focused on how individuals came to recognise themselves as mad,
as criminals or as ethical subjects of sexuality (Foucault, 1975; 1997a; 1997b). So, “[f]rom
the perspective of governmentality, government refers to a continuum, which extends from

political government right through to forms of self-regulation, namely ‘technologies of the
self’” (Lemke, 2000, p. 12).
No argument could be more eloquent than Foucault’s own words:
...if one wants to analyse the genealogy of the subject in Western civilisation,… one has to take
into account the points where the technologies of domination of individuals over one another
have recourse to processes by which the individual acts upon himself. And … the points where
the techniques of the self are integrated into structures of coercion and domination… Governing
people, in the broad meaning of the word, governing people is not a way to force people to do what
the governor wants; it is always a versatile equilibrium, with complementarities and conflicts
between techniques which assure coercion and processes through which the self is constructed or
modified by oneself. (Foucault, 1993, pp. 203–204, emphasis added)
The individual is an obedient subject, on which, around and in which authority is exercised.
He/she is a site of power, constantly reproducing it through practices of conformity to the
norm (Foucault, 1975).
Neoliberalism and the neoliberal subject
Let me now define how I interpret the term neoliberalism, especially when applied to con-
temporary Korea. It is essential to note that, following Foucault, it would be overly reductive
to define neoliberalism solely in economic terms – the so-called “Washington Consensus”
– although a range of criteria suggest that Korea has indeed become a neoliberal economy
(the number of FTAs signed in the last two decades is but one example). Authors who have
argued that South Korea has become a neoliberal state (Pirie, 2008; Ji, 2013a; 2013b) mostly
emphasise the economic dismantling of the developmental state.
Here again, I rely on Foucault to offer a distinctive understanding of neoliberalism that
goes beyond a purely economic definition. He introduces the notion of neoliberal gov-
ernmentality. He notes that “[t]he problem of neoliberalism is to … know how to manage
the global exercise of political power on the principles of a market economy”, evoking an
“economic tribunal” that is constantly judging and critically reviewing the actions of gov-
ernment, evaluating them according to the principles of market society (Foucault, 2004a,
p. 137, p. 252). The first aim of the neoliberal program of government is thus the subjection
of the realm of government to the scrutiny of economics. The second objective of neoliber-
alism is then to diffuse the “form of the company” to all social objects. Foucault argues that
“it is about turning market, competition, and consequently firm, into what we could call
the informing force of society” (Foucault, 2004a, p. 54). The market form is generalised and
becomes the grid of intelligibility according to which the social sphere can be understood.
Foucault notably describes the way neoliberal subjects manage their households and family
lives based on the model of the company. In line with this argument, we could also note
that the notion of human capital is revealing of this diffusion of the form of the company
to the whole social sphere.
The neoliberal political project can only be attained through a specific governmental-
ity, paving the way for the self-government of citizens. Diffuse power, through various
modalities such as discourses, political, corporate and academic institutions, among many
others, leads citizens to conceive of themselves as self-responsible, and exhorts them to
enthusiastically conform to the neoliberal project, under a narrative emphasising individual
freedom and self-management. They are invested with neoliberal rationality, and become

6 J. Schwak
not political citizens, but neoliberal subjects. This phenomenon is key to understanding
the forms of social mobilisation at play in neoliberalising societies, and is evidenced in the
imperative to “live Brand Korea”.
Discourse and practice of nation branding
In 2005, The New York Times Magazine’s “Year of Ideas” issue listed nation branding among
the most interesting ideas of the year, and quoted British consultant Simon Anholt: “Just
as companies have learned to ‘live the brand,’ countries should consider their reputations
carefully – because ... in the interconnected world, that’s what statecraft is all about” (The
New York Times Magazine, 11 December 2005). Nation branding is considered necessary
for governments that, at the beginning of the twentieth century, started to acknowledge
“the influence of global public opinion and market forces in international affairs” (Anholt,
2006b, p. 19).
TherootsofnationbrandinggobackwellbeforeSimonAnholtandhispeers.International
fairs were already a way to display a country’s achievements, material power and cultural
development in the nineteenth century. After World War II, national reputations started
to matter on the international scene, and Cantril and Buchanan published the first study
of international images and reputation (Cantril & Buchanan, 1953). In the 1990s, a “post-
modern branding revolution” took place, and advertising, marketing and public relations
(PR) became fundamental disciplines and fields of practice across and beyond the cor-
porate sector; the brand itself and its logo becoming “the focus of conventional efforts”
(Jansen, 2008, p. 125). This meshed with a growing concern about national reputation, and
the neoliberal shift in global political economy led to “a renewed relationship of mutual
dependency between nations and private corporations” (Aronczyk, 2013, p. 23). Nation
branding therefore “started to be considered the most legitimate way to make the nation
matter in a global context” (Aronczyk, 2013, p. 30). For Anholt, the nation brand became
“a clear and simple measure of a country’s ‘license to trade’ in the global marketplace and
the acceptability of its people, hospitality, culture, policies, products and services to the rest
of the world” (Anholt, 2010, p. 7).
Crucially, nation branding responded to the new discourse of competitiveness (Fougner,
2006), which urged national governments to withdraw from direct intervention in production
and foster competitive market relations throughout the economy and society. This competi-
tiveness imperative was imported to nations from the world of corporate management: Porter
suggested that “a new kind of knowledge and expertise was required for state administration,
one that comes from the worlds of marketing and management” (Porter, 1990, p. 46).
Nation branding, in short, constitutes “structural and discursive strategies that extend mar-
keting priorities into new social and political realms” (Greenberg, 2010, p. 116). It corresponds
to a paradigm of world order in which competitiveness has been normalised, accepted as an
inexorable force to which nations should adapt. Competitiveness involves, for its advocates, a
distorted Darwinian idea of international politics, in which a nation’s objective is to win over
its competitors and avoid being excluded from the global scene. What is at stake is whether the
nation corresponds to the “evolved” political form of the late twentieth and early twenty-first
centuries: “deregulated”, “entrepreneurial”, “open-minded” and “business friendly” (Aronczyk,
2013).Nation-brandingconsultantsjustifytheiractivitiesbyclaimingthatcountriesareobliged
tocompete:“I’mnotsurewhytheydoitbutIcantellyouthatiftheydidn’t,they’dgetleftbehind”

(Personalinterview,brandingconsultant,February2014,Mumbai).Inaworldgovernedbymar-
kets, “the rearticulation of national identity in marketing terms, then, [is] a matter of evolution
and even survival” (Kaneva, 2012, p. 115).
The practice of nation branding is thus an outgrowth of a discourse, contested of course
by radical critics, that presents globalisation as an inexorable force leading nations to com-
pete with one another in a global market place since the Cold War (Jansen, 2008, p. 121;
Aronczyk, 2013, p. 17). Jansen indeed makes the relevant observation that competitive-
ness can be considered as “the controlling myth or master narrative onto which individual
nations can project their respective micro-myths and articulate their aspirations for wealth,
power, and enhanced visibility” (Jansen, 2008, p. 122). As she implies, competitiveness is not
merely an economic reality, but rather works as a self-fulfilling discourse in which nation
branding becomes a necessity. Furthermore, nation branding is seen by its proponents as
a necessity since world politics have experienced “a shift in political paradigms, a move
from the modern world of geopolitics and power to the postmodern world of images and
influence” (Van Ham, 2001, p. 4). Nation branding is thus presented as the only acceptable
way to make the nation matter in this supposedly peaceful post-political world paradigm.
So where Olins’s Corporate Identity, a landmark text for private corporations, suggested that
the key to attaining corporate competitiveness was to foster a sense of loyalty, commitment
in the audience, and pride, nation-branding consultants try to create a similar sentiment
for nations (Aronczyk, 2013, p. 84; Olins, 2002, p. 247). This means that the domestic level
matters greatly in the process. As one nation-branding consultant I interviewed empha-
sised: “Nation branding is people-based”.2
It requires citizens to “live the brand” (Aronzyk,
2008), since the campaign’s focus is not only tourists, foreign investors and trading partners,
but also the nation’s citizens. This is seen by some critics as consultants’ hypocrisy in that
“although branding consultants prefer to describe citizens as ‘partners’ in the branding
process, empirical evidence demonstrates that they are, at best, limited partners, as well as
primary targets of branding initiatives” (Jansen, 2008, p. 91).
The practical manifestations of nation branding are diverse: “cosmetic” operations (crea-
tion of slogans, logos, supporting material such as videos, booklets, business meetings, cul-
tural events, and so forth) supervised by governmental or private-public bodies overseeing
the branding process in the long term (Kaneva, 2012 p. 118). In addition to the practitioner
literature in books and in journals such as Place Branding and Public Diplomacy or Journal
of Brand Management, nation branders have created indexes and benchmarking tools to
measure the competitiveness of nation brands. Among these, the Anholt-GfK Roper Nation
Brands Index annually measures the nation brands of 50 countries in different fields.3
This
literature argues that public officials have a poor understanding of nation branding and
that globalisation is an inevitable historical force motivating nations to constantly com-
pete; to do so governments need nation-branding consultants.
(Anholt, 2006a; Olins, 1999;
Papadopoulos, 2004).
Genealogy of the Korean Developmental Project: From Modernising Korea
to Globalising Korea
From General Park Chung-hee’s coup in 1961 until the late 1980s, the Korean state based
its legitimacy (albeit fragile) on its developmental character. Indeed, the “miraculous”
development of the peninsula has been acclaimed by various international organisations

8 J. Schwak
(World Bank, 1993) and a wide body of academic literature. While a free-market-oriented
explanation dominated until the 1990s (Fukuyama, 1992, p. 41), it has been replaced by a
strong emphasis on the state-led character of the developmental project, and Korea, after
Japan, has been characterised as a developmental state (see, for instance, Amsden, 1989;
Woo-Cumings, 1991; 1999; Wade, 2003). This interpretation mobilises the overwhelming
role of the state in efficiently managing market forces (Chang, 2006). More critical authors
have correctly underlined the encompassing influence of the state in mobilising the whole
country into its developmental ideology, thus referring to an “anticommunist developmental
regime” instead of the more politically neutral, and economic-oriented, term “developmental
state” (Cho, 2000).
Park’s political legitimacy rested upon his promise to transform Korea from an under-
developed, aid-dependent country into an independent and strong nation state, both mil-
itarily and economically (Kim, 2014). What is often taken for granted is the ideological
underpinning of such a national project, and the world view it assumed. As Lie noted (1998,
p. 147), “[t]he crucial underpinning of Korean state nationalism was the celebration of GNP
growth”. Park’s project of modernisation of the fatherland, jokuk kundaewha, “envisioned
a world of nation-states that were in fierce competition with one another and were ranked
hierarchically. His rhetoric of ‘modernisation’ and ‘catch-up’ suggests that the kundaewha
discourse accepted Korea’s low status in the hierarchy of nation states and the West’s position
at the top” (Kim, 2014, p. 4).
To transform Korea into “a modern, productive, constantly growing society” (Park
Chung-hee, quoted in Lie, 1998, p. 43), the authoritarian leadership relied on the construc-
tion of a pro-growth, nationalistic ideology, which provided a basis of legitimacy for the
sacrifice of a repressed labour force enrolled in the developmental project to provide cheap
labour power for the ambitious state-led industrialisation programs to be implemented by
the chaebols. This was mostly evident under the Yushin Constitution (1972–81), which
legally denied labour its most basic rights (Lie, 1998).
The set of mobilisation institutions and programs put in place to ensure economic growth
but also to secure citizens’ commitment and willingness to sacrifice to the developmental
project has been referred to as “mobilised modernisation”, a term that renders very well
the characteristics of the developmental regime put in place in Korea from the 1960s (Cho,
2010). One notable modality of mass mobilisation of citizens to participate in national
development was the New Village Movement (Saemaul Undong), a developmental program
targeting rural areas.
In 1987, nationwide protests forced President Chun Doo-hwan to abandon the authori-
tarian system and to implement a legally democratic system. The end of the military regime
and the economic achievements of the country at the end of the 1980s led governmental
concerns to shift from their focus on modernisation to emphasise the necessity of fully
embracing globalisation. The election of President Kim Young-sam in 1992 was a turning
point in Korea’s engagement with globalisation. The new government adopted a new foreign
policy paradigm, segyehwa (“globalisation policy”).
Segyehwa’s objective was for Korea to “become a central country to the world” (Segyehwa
White Paper, 1998), recognising the country’s socioeconomic and political achievements in
the preceding decades. More than adapting to globalisation, Kim emphasised the adoption
of globalisation as a state policy. Segyehwa was born out of a “recognition of a move from
the periphery to the core” (MOFAT, 1998) and a worldview in which globalisation could

be “a shortcut that will lead us [Korea] to building a first-class country in the twenty-first
century” (Kim Young-sam, 1995, New Year’s address, January).
This meant opening the country to the world and dismantling the institutions of the
developmental state to better perform in an increasingly neoliberal global economic setting.
Indeed, the new democratic regime accepted the principle of economic liberalisation of the
country. Despite fierce opposition from labour organisations, the country joined the WTO
in 1995 and the OECD in 1996.
Although Kim Young-sam was a democrat and had been a long-term opponent of the
military regime, the path-dependency of Park’s developmental project should not be missed
in Kim’s segyehwa policy. As Kang comments:
Recall that Park saw the world as a place in which nation-states compete against one another
and envisioned kundaehwa as a strategy to survive such fierce competition. Kim Young-sam
promoted a similar sense of vulnerability and crisis. At the Seattle Summit conference on APEC
in November 1993, he declared the beginning of his segyehwa drive, with which Korea ‘should
prepare for the coming twenty-first century, an era of unlimited competition, by planning
survival strategy of internationalisation equipped with the supreme competitiveness of the
whole world’. (The Newspaper of National Affairs, 20 August 1994, cited in Kang, 2000, p. 448)
Through segyehwa, Koreans were to follow the model of “more affluent Western [states]”
(Moon, 2005, p. 110), for which the government emphasised the need for citizens to con-
form to international norms and standards. As Kim points out, “[A]s Korea repositions
itself from the bottom to the middle and aspires to be a top country, conforming to Western
norms has become an important component of developmental strategies” (Kim, 2014, p. 4).
Exhorting Koreans to behave as “mature global citizens” through non-coercive mass mobili-
sation campaigns was considered essential to the accomplishment of segyehwa (Kang, 2000,
p. 450). Koreans were thus exhorted to accept cultural diversity, be aware of global issues
such as peace and human rights, and actively and responsibly participate in world affairs.4
The subsequent Presidents, Kim Dae-jung and Lee Myung-bak, although from opposite
ends of the political spectrum, both continued to emphasise the centrality of globalisation
in the modern development of Korea, once more relating to an understanding of world
order in which competitiveness is the key driving force of government policies. This was
manifested in the continuation of neoliberal policies, and through urging Koreans to “glo-
balise” (Kalinowski & Cho, 2012).
In December 1997, Kim Dae-jung, a democratic opposition activist, succeeded Kim
Young-sam. Globalisation was, for Kim Dae-jung as it had been for Kim Young-sam, a way
to “join the ranks of first-rate societies” (Kim, 1999a). He also considered globalisation to be
crucial for Korean foreign policy, seeing it as “in no way restricted to the economy” (Jojin,
2013, p. 9). His aim was to make every citizen a global citizen, and he argued that the country
could only progress if it participated in globalisation and “embraced the challenges of the
new millennium” (Kim, 1999b). Therefore, in 2002, Korea, together with Japan, held the
first Football World Cup in Asia. In 2002 and 2004, the government held nation-branding
conferences with professors, ambassadors, chief executives and brand experts, in order to
understand how foreigners perceived Korea (Lee, 2005).
With Lee Myung-bak’s election in 2008, the new policy line, “Global Korea”, reflected
previous globalisation concerns. Like his predecessors, Lee was convinced that “Korea must
globalise in order to survive global competition” (Lee, 2008, p. 4). His government’s foreign
policy line was to promote a more active global role for Korea. For instance, he deployed

10 J. Schwak
troops to Afghanistan in 2009 alongside the US, despite hostile public opinion. World
Friends Korea, a government-run overseas volunteer program modelled on the United States
Peace Corps, was inaugurated in May 2009 and aimed to send young Korean volunteers to
the developing world in line with their roles as global citizens. Indeed, WFK gives as one
the organisation’s objectives the cultivation of “mature global citizens who, being open-
minded about multiculturalism in South Korean society, contribute to the co-prosperity
of mankind” (World Friends Korea). The creation of WFK was an outcome of the develop-
ment cooperation policy launched with the establishment of KOICA (Korea International
Cooperation Agency) in 1991.
So far, I have demonstrated the legacy of the developmental project launched by Park in
the early 1960s in democratic governments from the 1990s. Although some studies suggest,
with reason, that Korea is no longer a developmental state but has become a neoliberal
state (Pirie, 2008; Ji, 2013a; 2013b), I consider that this transformation does not hinder
the path-dependency of the developmental project and the world view it envisions. Korea
might indeed have, if not become a neoliberal state, at least dismantled its developmental
state model to fit into neoliberal globalisation. But this is done in the same context that has
characterised Korean development from the 1960s: strengthening the Korean economy,
notably through promoting world-leading chaebols, and making Korea a successful “site
of capital accumulation” (Pirie, 2008) in the competitive world system.
Branding Korea
At the heart of “Global Korea”, the concern for Korea’s global image met the phenomenon
of nation branding. The discourse of survival, underlined by nation-branding consult-
ants, is strikingly similar to that used by Lee Myung-bak’s administration. In May 2006,
Anholt was the keynote speaker at the “Nation Brands in the Global Market” conference in
Seoul, held by the Korea Image Development Committee. He concluded his observations
by declaring that Korea had “a major image problem” in the West. Suggesting the need for
his intervention, he considered that survey respondents had confused North and South
Korea, and had therefore described the Korean government as “dangerous”, “unstable” and
“unpredictable” (Anholt, 2011, p. 294). Despite the country’s “great advances in prosperity,
stability, transparency, productivity, education” and culture, and the success of hallyu (“the
Korean wave”) in East and Southeast Asia, Anholt claimed that Korea remained relatively
unknown, if not actually known for its negative image, in the rest of the world.5
To justify
this claim, he used a range of nation-branding indexes, including the one he had designed:
during the 2000s, the Korean image seemed to deteriorate in successive nation-brand sur-
veys; indeed, between 2005 and 2008, it fell from 25th
to 33rd
in the Anholt-GfK Roper
Nation Brands Index.
Despite the questionable objectivity of these rankings, President Lee, former Hyundai
Heavy Construction CEO and mayor of Seoul, took Anholt’s comments on Korea’s poor
scores in nation-branding rankings very seriously. The concern was focused on the so-called
“Korea Discount” phenomenon, the gap between the country’s development accomplish-
ments and its poor image in the eyes of international audiences.
Following the developmental project outlined above, Korea indeed became a successful
global “site of capital accumulation” (Pirie, 2008), and was transformed from “a basket case
of developmental failure” to “a solid upper-middle income country”, entering the OECD

in 1996 (Chang, 2008, p. 5, p. 12). One Korean government official linked this transfor-
mation to the contemporary exigency of nation branding, recalling common statements
characterising the collective memory of Korea: “Korea has the experience of war, it was
the poorest country in the world, and we were aid recipients. It was a long time ago, but
this history is still affecting many people. It is an obstacle for us to promote our country.
So our government really thinks that nation branding is important” (Personal interview,
government official, February 2014, London).
It has been argued that, consequently, many foreigners still believed Korea was an under-
developed, aid dependent country, at least until the 2002 World Cup and the subsequent
decade of segyehwa policy, and that Korean companies chose not to advertise their country
of origin, preferring to be branded globally (Dinnie, 2009). The discourse on Korea’s poor
image used by nation-branding consultants has become fixed in the minds of Koreans and
foreign observers alike.
Consequently, in his 2008 Liberation Day speech, President Lee declared: “It is extremely
important for Koreans to win the respect of the international community… Korea is one of
the most technologically advanced nations. And yet, the first images coming to the minds
of foreigners are strikes and street demonstrations. If our nation wants to be ‘approved’ as
an advanced country, then it … needs to improve its image and its reputation significantly”
(Lee, 2008). Following this appeal, Lee Myung-bak created the Presidential Council on
Nation Branding on 22 January 2009. As Dinnie observed, “the government has committed
significant resources and energy to position the Korea Brand as vibrant, dynamic democracy,
creative and open to the world” (Dinnie, 2009, p. 95). I argue that these attributes suggest a
neoliberal lexicon (“dynamic”, “creative”) and are embedded in the discourse of competitive
organisation (Beck, 1986).
The Korean government has organised nation branding in a way that no other nation has.
As Lee Doo-hee, a professor at Korea University and member of the Presidential Council
on Nation Branding put it: “No [other] nation has taken systematic measures to improve its
nation brand, particularly by establishing a separate organization and by creating its own
tool for international comparison” (Lee, 2010, p. 42). The Council was indeed unsatisfied
with the Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index. As its first chairman Eun Yoon-dae
put it, “[s]o far, the Nation Brands Index developed by Simon Anholt has been used, but
it has problems in its study methods and is scientifically inaccurate. Moreover, we could
not really figure out why Korea ranked 31st
. So we needed a new index that could give us a
more concrete evaluation” (Lee, 2010, p. 73). Consequently, from 2009, the Council worked
with a Korean think tank, SERI (Samsung Economic Research Institute), to create a Korean
index for comparing nation brands: the Seri-PNCB NBDO Nation Brand Dual Octagon.6
According to the former website of the Council, “[n]ation brand is the dignity of a coun-
try. Korea must raise its global status by making efforts to gain credibility and likability in
the international arena” (PCNB, 2009). Therefore, the Council’s main objectives were “to
increase Korea’s commitment and contribution to the international community; to help
Koreans become responsible, respectful global citizens; and to promote Korean products
and services” (PCNB, 2009). It had 47 members (13 government officials and 34 others,
mostly from the academic and private sectors); 24 international advisors also sat on five
different committees (Kim, 2011).
In March 2009, the PCNB presented a 10-part plan for action. Among its leading initia-
tives, aiming to show its benevolent commitment to international cooperation as a country

12 J. Schwak
ready and willing to address global challenges, World Friends Korea would send more than
3,000 young Koreans to developing countries every year to participate in development efforts
(Kim, 2011). Public diplomacy would be developed, with the nomination of an Ambassador
for Public Diplomacy based in Seoul to take advantage of the hallyu phenomenon (Shim,
2011), and Korean international aid to developing countries would be increased, together
with the adoption of a Korean Wave Program to help developing countries achieve rapid
economic development based on the Korean development model. In addition, the PCNB
sought to attract young foreign talent and foster academic relations between Korean and
foreign universities through the Global Korea Scholarship Program and the Campus Asia
Program. Finally, it sought to help Koreans become global citizens by fostering a greater
sense of respect for cultural diversity and open-mindedness in Korean society, through
academic exchange programs and the establishment of educational foreign cultural centres
in Korea. The PCNB also emphasised the need to achieve better treatment and integration
of foreigners and multicultural families through the Rainbow Korea TV campaign, which
encourages Koreans to welcome foreigners and improve their global etiquette (Kim, 2011).
The private sector was also involved in the nation-branding strategy. The business sector
participated by opening new Korean Chambers of Commerce around the world, thus foster-
ing the promotion of the Republic of Korea as an investment destination. The entertainment
industry was the source of the hallyu phenomenon, which refers to the increased popularity
of Korean pop music and media productions worldwide (see, for instance, Messerlin & Shin,
2013; Kim, 2011). This cultural wave has probably been the key driving force of Korean
nation branding. This led the Council to launch a “Global Korea” campaign, in collaboration
with major chaebols (Samsung, LG, Hyundai) and entertainment companies (SM, YG, JYP),
to incorporate this successful wave of Korean popular culture into the governmental agenda.
Crucially, South Korean nation branding required citizens to “live Brand Korea”. Living
the brand is a key part of any nation-branding strategy (Anholt, 2003)7
and entails having
ordinary citizens perform “attitudes and behaviours that are compatible with the brand
strategy” (Aronczyk, 2008, p. 54). Since Brand Korea was that of a global, multicultural and
dynamic country, Korean citizens have been given the responsibility of acting accordingly.
Unveiling the set of dispositives of power that characterise governmentality in neoliberal
Korea opens up a promising research agenda. The imperative of competitiveness carried out
by the discourse of nation branding is instilled in society by numerous dispositives of power
which, as Foucault noted, are constituted of “discourses, institutions [such as the PCNB or
the one-off World Education Forum that took place in Korea in May 2015 (Korea Times, 24
April 2015)], architectural forms [grand infrastructural projects such as the Incheon Airport
or Songdo – “the world’s greenest city”], administrative measures, scientific statements [such
as the creation of an industry literature on Korean nation branding and competitiveness, to
which the Seri-PNCB NBDO Nation Brand Dual Octagon belongs], philosophical, moral
and philanthropic propositions” (Deleuze, 2004, p. 3).
This article has aimed to be a first step in building a topographic study of the micro-
power derived from the nation-branding discourse in Korean society. A series of additional
studies on the dispositives introduced above would require a multidisciplinary framework
and could lead, through a Foucauldian methodology, to unveiling how Korean citizens
are constantly transformed and transform themselves into competitive neoliberal subjects.
Further manifestations of this subtle power could be revealed by looking at the top-down
imperative of fostering multiculturalism or a creative economy, the increased pressure put

on Korean youth to be competitive entrepreneurs of the self in the global job market and
the culture of labour flexibility that has emerged since the 1990s, the reliance on individual
responsibility for issues such as social security, the overwhelming pressure put on students
to perform in an increasingly competitive education system now embedded in a global
educational market place, or the push for the abandonment of the last vestiges of tradi-
tional patterns of life and consumption towards a cosmopolitan, middle-class existence, in
accordance with the standards of global normalcy.
Conclusion
This article has shown that Korean nation branding needs to be put into a historical per-
spective, starting from Park Chung-hee’s development project in the early 1960s. Although
Korean nation branding can in part be explained by the increasing appeal of nation branding
from the late 1990s, it should also be placed within the context of constant reinvention of
Korea as “a site of capitalist accumulation” in a global competitive setting (Pirie, 2008). This
path-dependent governmental project has required the mobilisation of citizens during and
after the military dictatorship. This article has argued that although the modalities of social
control have evolved with the democratisation of the country, they still play a central role
in transforming Koreans into top-end capitalist citizens.
Neoliberal governmentality, as it invests citizens and introduces a social rationality that
appears beyond question, might seem even more pervasive than coercive “mobilised mod-
ernisation” (Cho, 2010). This is not to say that this governmentality does not face limits,
tensions and sometimes violent reactions (Foucault, 1975). Consider the fierce anti-G20
demonstrations that took place in 2010, the Korean labour unions’ constant and strong
opposition to the progressive economic liberalisation of the country (exemplified by a
number of severe strikes against privatisation plans, most notably the KORAIL privatisation
plan in 2014), and the recent Annyong dul hasimnikka (“How are we all doing?”) movement
that testifies to social unease among Korean youth (Yoon, 2013): all parasitic upon the
consensual Global Korea image that the government tries to sell, suggesting that making
Korean citizens competitive global citizens is not as smooth a process as the inexorable
imperative to compete would suggest.
In 2013, newly elected President Park Geun-hee decided to dissolve the Presidential
Council on Nation Branding, as it had been the target of much criticism by foreign observ-
ers for its lack of coherence and its “archaic” management (Personal interview, foreign
reporter, March 2014, Seoul). Nevertheless, it seems that the promotion of the Korean cre-
ative economy and the Saenuri Party’s praise of multiculturalism are elements of a similar
strategy aimed at enhancing Korean competitiveness and requiring citizens once again
to feel responsible for actively participating and succeeding in the global competitive set-
ting through fostering their identities as global citizens. Korean nation branding, when
understood in the long-term perspective of national development and within the paradigm
of global competitiveness, thus provides an excellent case study in understanding how
Foucauldian modalities of power are exercised in post-industrialised, formally democratic
nations, through neoliberal technologies of the self that invest citizens and supplement
mass mobilisation. Nevertheless, as Foucault was careful to note (Foucault, 1975), this new
typography of power does not suggest that power is rigidly structural; rather, as the Korean
case highlights, this governmentality is a constant source of tensions and evolution.

14 J. Schwak
This article has focused on Korean nation branding, and has shown both its endogenous
characteristics and its global character. This global aspect deserves additional attention,
since Korea is one among many nations that have resorted to nation branding to “make
it” in the global competitive race. Comparing Korean nation branding with that of other
Northeast Asian and post-Soviet nations leads to the identification of common patterns
among nation-branding campaigns, especially in transitioning countries. The involvement
of Western brand consultants is a major commonality of nation-branding strategies in devel-
oping countries in which, more often than not, the West is perceived as a source of legitimate
knowledge by local elites (Personal interview, branding consultant, March 2014, London)
and as a model to be emulated (Kaneva, 2012; Aronczyk, 2013). Nation branding almost
invariably leads to the creation of a group of local actors who take on the nation-branding
expertise locally (Kaneva, 2012).
All nation-branding projects seem to share a common duplicity of objectives: not only
is nation branding a transnational practice, “it also responds to domestic political aims,
measures and processes as well” (Valaskivi, 2013, p. 4; see also Barr, 2011). Indeed, nation
branding was certainly a way for President Lee Myung-bak to restore his legitimacy, threat-
ened by the costly and unpopular Four River Project or the signing of the KORUS, while in
Japan it responded to a national feeling of crisis after the 2011 Great Earthquake (Valaskivi,
2013). China has also been investing considerable resources in its image campaign as a
nation-building strategy (De Kloet, Pak, & Landsberger, 2011; Barr, 2011). In Kazakhstan,
nation branding is used to legitimise Nazarbayev’s authoritarian regime (Fauve, 2015). But
most importantly, ever since the segyehwa paradigm – as a precursor to Korean nation
branding responding to the need to define Korea as a newly democratic nation – Korean
nation branding could be seen as responding to similar objectives to post-Soviet nation
branding. In post-Soviet countries, nation branding is a way to deal with the difficulties of
the transition period. This transition is marked by a desire to shift from what is perceived
as a “backward”, undesired identity to a desired identity, which is the “ideological project
of post-communist national identity construction” (Kaneva, 2012, p. 6), but is also relevant
to early 1990s Korea as it sought to erase its image as both a poverty-stricken developing
country and a severe authoritarian regime.
What matters in most nation-branding strategies, and particularly in countries such as
Korea or Eastern European countries whose images have been tarnished by decades of dicta-
torship, a reputation for economic protectionism or the undesirable spectre of communism,
is to “render [these countries] suitable for global consumption” (Kaneva & Popescu, 2011,
p. 201). National identity becomes ahistorical, apolitical, expurgated from the societal con-
flicts and deliberations it involves, and in line with the imperatives of the global market.
While in a few countries, such as Japan, nation branding has mostly focused on mar-
keting strategies, countries such as Korea have emphasised attitudinal change throughout
society. This is notably the case in countries such as Sweden, Finland and China (Valaskivi,
2013, p. 7; De Kloet, Pak, & Landsberger, 2011). Consequently, these states, through nation
branding, have enrolled their citizens in the construction of a collective competitive identity.
As demonstrated, contemporary Korea is an exemplar of this phenomenon.

Notes
1. I use the term “formally” in a value-neutral way, in order to avoid questioning whether
South Korea is a substantial democracy, a debate that has been revived lately by diverse
scandals and threats to freedom of speech. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/
world/2014/mar/04/pyongyang-south-korea-jails-politician and http://english.hani.co.kr/
arti/english_edition/e_editorial/670016.html. Whether any formal democracy in the world
is indeed a substantial democracy remains largely open to debate.
2. All translations from French are my translations.
3. “What is essential is ownership, participation and maximum openness. The only way to make
it durable is to have the public, which will always be interested in this. Transparency is crucial”
(Personal interview, nation-branding consultant, London, March 2014).
4. The Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index is the most well-known nation-branding index. It
is an annual survey based on a series of on-line interviews with samples of citizens (according
to different criteria: age, gender, ethnicity, education) from 50 nations. Retrieved from http://
www.simonanholt.com/Publications/publications-other-articles.aspx. The choice of nations
“is based on the political and economic importance of the nations in global geopolitics and
the flow of trade, businesses, people, and tourism activities” (Anholt-GfK Roper Nation
Brands Index). It divides the nation brand into 6 categories: exports, immigration, governance,
culture, tourism and people. Each consultancy usually sets up its own index, using a different
methodology. Retrieved from http://www.brandfinance.com/knowledge_centre/reports/
brandfinance-nation-brands-2013
5. The survey was developed by SERI and the PCNB in 2009, and is divided between the main
categoriesof “substanceandimage”,andevaluatesthenationbrandsof50nationsaccordingtoeight
categories (the Octagon): “economy/corporations, science/technology, infrastructure, policies/
institutions,heritage,modernculture,peopleandcelebrities”.Retrievedfromhttp://www.google.
com.hk/url?sa=trct=jq=esrc=sfrm=1source=webcd=4ved=0CDQQFjADurl=
http%3A%2F%2Fwww.seriworld.org%2F16%2Fqt_PdfDown.html%3Fmncd
%3D0301%26pub%3D20130220%26seq%3D314ei=VGO3VLvLIJSGuAS-
roCADwusg=AFQjCNH_UGcu_k4Yz612f4eJXW-7noBuDAsig2=sybZHZvO_1W0_
ncd7QSMZgbvm=bv.83640239,d.dGY. The impartiality of the creators of this survey could
be questioned. Moreover, the methodology does not seem dramatically different from the
Anholt-GfK NBI’s.
6. A brand is successful when “public speaks to publics; when a substantial proportion of the
population of the country – not just civil servants and paid figureheads – get behind the
strategy and live it in their everyday dealings with the outside world” (Anholt, 2003, p. 123).
7. This is still an objective of the current South Korean administration. See http://www.
koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2015/04/116_177719.html
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Professor Ivan Manokha, Professor Justin Robertson and Professor Paul
Cammack for their support, from the beginning of this research project to the completion of this
article.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
ORCID
Juliette Schwak http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5257-3770

16 J. Schwak
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