The document summarizes the results and implications of South Korea's first stage Revitalization Project from 2005 to 2007. It aimed to promote new vitality in underdeveloped areas by providing annual budgets between KRW 2-3 billion to selected cities and counties. Unlike past top-down development projects, this adopted a bottom-up approach where local governments established their own plans with central government support. A key strategy was strengthening regional innovation capacity, such as through ASP models of nurturing local leaders and organizations. The success of projects depended more on existing specialized local industries and strengthening innovation capacity, such as Inje-gun's village leader education program, rather than new construction projects.

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The first stage Revitalization Project
- Results and Implications
Professor Kee-Won Lee
Let's take a look at the new vitality projects that were implemented from 2005 to
2007 that represent the policies of the underdeveloped areas of the Participatory
Government during the President Roh Moo-hyun era. In order to promote the new
vitality project, first, by reviewing the indicators in terms of population, industry,
and finance, the cities, counties, and wards of the country are ranked from high to
low, and then 70 cities and counties belonging to the bottom 30% are selected as
new vitality areas. The 10% with favorable conditions receive KRW 2 billion
annually, the middle 10% receive KRW 2.5 billion each year, and the bottom 10%
receive KRW 3 billion annually, and a business plan for three years is established.
Unlike the existing regional development projects that were planned by the central
government and carried out according to uniform guidelines, the new vitality
project is planned and established by the regional initiative, and the central
government provides consulting and intermediate support for the plans established
by the local government. It was promoted in a bottom-up way to manage
inspection and performance evaluation. In particular, it provided a very practical
policy management strategy for project promotion, helping to establish a plan. The
policy management strategy was divided into strengthening regional innovation
capacity, compounding 1-2-3 industries, and promoting exchange between urban and
rural areas, and most cities and counties adopted them. In particular, the ASP
model, presented as a strategy for strengthening innovation capacity, was well
received in many regions as a natural flow of systematically nurturing people and
organizations in the region to carry out projects. The importance of strategies to
strengthen innovation capabilities is highlighted in the question of who gets the
vitality by implementing these projects.
Among the cities and counties of the new vitality area, there were many cases
where the specialized items that had been nurtured in the region before were more
developed than the new vitality project itself in the case of the cities and counties
that were considered as excellent cases within the project period, while Inje-gun is
considered a case of faithfully following the ASP model. In particular, the village
leader education program nurtured local innovative leaders and organized 7 research
groups to systematically study the idea of ​
​
discovering and commercializing local
resources. The fact that such a regional innovation capacity-strengthening project is
more important than the construction of bridges or buildings is explained by
focusing on the process of overcoming the flood that occurred in Inje-gun in 2006.
It leaves a lesson that even if the facility is washed away by flood waters, the
skills accumulated through deep learning do not wash away.