KJC Korea
Journal Central

The question to be addressed in this paper is, “Why are the in-house contracting issues in Korea not resolved despite the Supreme Court’s ruling finding it to be ‘unlawful dispatch’ and workers’ resistance?” The reasons can be surmised as followsbased on case studies including Hyundai Motor’s, interviews, and secondary literature analysis. First, the anachronistic form of in-house contracting has been established as the ‘Korean standard model’ with the government’s policy support. Second, the Korean standard has won legitimacy on the grounds of efficiency. Third, organizational isomorphism such as benchmarking large companies. Fourth, the impossibility of forming labor-management relations. Thus any solution would have to be a nationwide system that goes beyond the boundary of individual companies like Hyundai Motor, and this paper presents some possible options. First, improving the legal system to encourage rational use of in-house contracting and eliminate unlawful contracting. Second, reforming the public sector to be more employment-friendly. Third, amending the Act on Trade Unions to make it easier to set up and join unions, and eliminating the dual restriction on union membership as specified in the union charter and collective bargaining agreement. Fourth, seeking a supra-enterprise bargaining arrangement that goes beyond company-level bargaining.

The principal objective of this study was to explore the changes and strategies of welfare states based on the welfare-labor nexus, and to assess the possibility of categorizing the East Asian welfare regime. This study reflected multi-dimensional aspects of welfare states and assessed the extent of the relevant changes using ideal-type analysis based on a fuzzy-set approach to overcome or circumvent existing methodological–theoretical limitations. As a result of this analysis, most countries were shown to have their own systematic combination of welfare-labor nexus and changing strategies, whereas Sweden and US have maintained traditional haracteristics of welfare programs. In particular, East Asian countries exhibit divergent patterns of change and strategies that cannot be converged into a single category. Whereas Korea has changed into a liberal welfare state using a strategy designed to lower the level of employment protection legislation, Japan has mainly utilized a wage inequality design, which employs some hybrid and unique features.

Approaching the family-centric nature of South Korea’s social reproduction system as an element of the developmental liberal social policy regime, I argue that the widespread social reproduction crisis in recent years is epitomized by the rise of ‘risk family’. This phonomenon is an outcome of the excessive public and private reliance on and/or exploitation of family as exacerbated by neoliberal social policies and trends. Considering two broad areas of social reproduction crisis - namely, material collapse and demographic impasse - I examine (and, if necessary, conceptualize)various critical social trends that constitute each of these areas. The recently activated political and academic debates should systematically reflect or include the serious efforts to overcome developmental liberalism and its ramifications in social reproduction crisis.

This essay is to explain, in terms of strategy of state for mobilizing national pension fund, the change of governance structure of national pension fund management and corporate. National pension fund, introduced as a economic method of industrialization financing under based bank-based financial system, is used for activation of financial market and defence of corporate govenance against takeover, as financial system is changed by market based financial system through IMF economic crisis. The operation direction of national pension fund is determined ostensibly by national pension fund management committee, but substantially by state strategy. It’s just difference that state operated national pension fund management directly before IMF but indirectly since then. Korea government is try to change the national pension fund management committee to composition of financing experts and to make the best use of the voting right of national pension fund for improving corporate governance. How the voting right of stockholders for national pension fund is mobilized for improving corporate governance depends on the change in the power balance of the market and state. We should be concerned controlling arbitrariness of market and shareholders of chaebol while maximizing contributor’ interest.

The principal objective of this study was to explore the changes and strategies of welfare states based on the welfare-labor nexus, and to assess the possibility of categorizing the East Asian welfare regime. This study reflected multi-dimensional aspects of welfare states and assessed the extent of the relevant changes using ideal-type analysis based on a fuzzy-set approach to overcome or circumvent existing methodological–theoretical limitations. As a result of this analysis, most countries were shown to have their own systematic combination of welfare-labor nexus and changing strategies, whereas Sweden and US have maintained traditional characteristics of welfare programs. In particular, East Asian countries exhibit divergent patterns of change and strategies that cannot be converged into a single category. Whereas Korea has changed into a liberal welfare state using a strategy designed to lower the level of employment protection legislation, Japan has mainly utilized a wage inequality design, which employs some hybrid and unique features.

This study examined the effects of using the National Basic Livelihood Security System(NBLSS) in reducing economic hardship among low-income families. For this goal, this study analyzed data of low-income families from the Korea Welfare Panel Study [KOWEPS] and adopted the propensity score weight method to reduce selection bias. The main research findings were as follows. Compared with the regression analyses which controlled the variables that affect the use of the NBLSS, the propensity score weight method was more effective in reducing selection bias. However, even when the propensity score weight method was applied, the use of the NBLSS was not effective in reducing economic hardship among low-income families. Finally, the implications of this research for Korean social policy were discussed.

This study is to find out perception types of long-term care managers who work in long term care center of National Health Insurance Corporations. Long-term care managers work for grade classification, service utilization plan and monitoring. So it is important for their perception to develop care management system in long-term care insurance. Therefor this study adopted Q methodology which is developed mainly to study on the subjective conceptualization of related people on research theme. This study found out four major types of perception on care management as role of present “standardized long-term care plan” in long-term care insurance scheme. They are the type of focusing professionalization of care manager, valuing on client-oriented needs, focusing standard criteria for care management, and insisting on more forcing present standardized care plan. Two of the former are types for care management as individualized professionalism and two of the latter are types for care management as standardized resource control. This research findings can be used to make clear understanding on diverse voices about care management. This kind of understanding would contribute to mutual understanding and clear communication to arrive positive consensus related to the matters of long-term care insurance.