Employing new-institutionalism as its analytic framework, this study explores the circumstantial characteristics and institutional legacies of the Korean welfare state in the past and present, with a view to providing policy implications for the design of an improved welfare state for the country in the future. This report is composed of 11 chapters. Chapters 1 and 2 are devoted to introducing the overall structure of this report’s analytic framework. The most basic premise of this report is that welfare state is linked on the one hand with market economy and on the other with democracy, and that the process of democratization (democratic-political characteristics) and industrialization (market-economy characteristics) in many countries is pivotal to understanding the evolution of their welfare state regimes. Chapter 3 discusses the formation of Korea’s economic and industrial structures in terms production, social welfare and capitalist diversity. Chapter 4 is an examination of the increasing dualization of the labor market as the main source of income for people and their families. In Chapter 5, the authors examine the characteristics of the Korean education system in the historical context of the country’s higher education system. Chapter 6 shows in a comparison with other countries that Korea’s welfare regime remains strongly familistic in character despite the rapid change the country has seen in its family structure and intra-family support. Chapters 7, 8, 9, and 10 are devoted to discussing in what ways the Korean welfare state, given its unique characteristics, could be improved in the future. These chapters take a historical institutionalist approach to discussing the structure of Korea’s unique welfare state, its financing and service delivery, and people’s attitude towards the various elements of social welfare. Lastly, Chapter 11 revisits and refines what has been discussed in previous chapters, analyzes the outcome of the troika of capitalism, democracy, and welfare state in Korea’s historical context, and explores challenges and prospects for Korea’s future welfare state.
